TREE  OF 

EAVEN 


INC  LAI R 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


IN  MEMORY  OF 
MRS.  VIRGINIA  B.  SPORER 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

KBW  YORK   •    BOSTON   -    CHICAGO  •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA   •    SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Limitbd 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  Ltd. 

TORONTO 


THE 
TREE  OF  HEAVEN 


BY 

MAY  SINCLAIR 

Author  of 
"The  Belfry,"  "The  Three  Sisters,"  etc. 


Nro  f  nrk 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

1917 

All  rights  reserved 


Copyright  1917 
By  MAY  SINCLAIR 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published,  December,   1917. 


College 
Library 


PAET  I 

PEACE 


11&1QHO 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 


PEACE 


Feances  Harbison  was  sitting  out  in  the  garden  under 
the  tree  that  her  husband  called  an  ash-tree,  and  that  the 
people  down  in  her  part  of  the  country  called  a  tree  of 
Heaven. 

It  was  warm  under  the  tree,  and  Frances  might  have 
gone  to  sleep  there  and  wasted  an  hour  out  of  the  after- 
noon, if  it  hadn't  been  for  the  children. 

Dorothy,  Michael  and  Nicholas  were  going  to  a  party, 
and  Nicky  was  excited.  She  could  hear  Old  Nanna 
talking  to  Michael  and  telling  him  to  be  a  good  boy.  She 
could  hear  young  Mary-Nanna  singing  to  Baby  John. 
Baby  John  was  too  young  himself  to  go  to  parties ;  so  to 
make  up  for  that  he  was  riding  furiously  on  Mary- 
Nanna' s  knee  to  the  tune  of  the  "  Bumpetty-Bumpetty 
Major!" 

It  was  Nicky's  first  party.  That  was  why  he  was  ex- 
cited. 

He  had  asked  her  for  the  third  time  what  it  would  be 
like;  and  for  the  third  time  she  had  told  him.  There 
would  be  dancing  and  a  Magic  Lantern,  and  a  Funny 

3 


4  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Han,  and  a  Big  White  Cake  covered  with  sugar  icing 
and  Rosalind's  name  on  it  in  pink  sugar  letters  and  eight 
little  pink  wax  candles  burning  on  the  top  for  Rosalind's 
birthday.     Nicky's  eyes  shone  as  she  told  him. 

Dorothy,  who  was  nine  years  old,  laughed  at 
Nicky. 

"  Look  at  Nicky,"  she  said,  "  how  excited  he  is !  " 

And  every  time  she  laughed  at  him  his  mother  kissed 
him. 

"  I  don't  care,"  said  Nicky.  "  I  don't  care  if  I  am 
becited !  " 

And  for  the  fifth  time  he  asked,  "  When  will  it  be 
time  to  go  ?  " 

"  Not  for  another  hour  and  a  half,  my  sweetheart." 

"  How  long,"  said  Nicky,  "  is  an  hour  and  a  half  ?  " 


Frances  had  a  tranquil  nature  and  she  never  worried. 
But  as  she  sat  under  her  tree  of  Heaven  a  thought  came 
that  made  a  faint  illusion  of  worry  for  her  mind.  She 
had  forgotten  to  ask  Grannie  and  Auntie  Louie  and 
Auntie  Emmeline  and  Auntie  Edie  to  tea. 

She  had  come  to  think  of  them  like  that  in  relation  to 
her  children  rather  than  to  her  or  to  each  other. 

It  was  a  Tuesday,  and  they  had  not  been  there  since 
Friday.  Perhaps,  she  thought,  I'd  better  send  over  for 
them  now.  Especially  as  it's  such  a  beautiful  afternoon. 
Supposing  I  sent  Michael  ? 

And  yet,  supposing  Anthony  came  home  early?  He 
was  always  kind  to  her  people,  but  that  was  the  very 
reason  why  she  oughtn't  to  let  them   spoil   a  beautiful 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  5 

afternoon  for  hirn.  It  could  not  be  said  that  any  of  them 
was  amusing. 

She  could  still  hear  Mary-Nanna  singing  her  song  about 
the  Bumpetty-Bum petty  Major.  She  could  still  hear  Old 
Xanna  talking  to  Michael  and  telling  him  to  be  a  good 
boy.  That  could  only  end  in  Michael  being  naughty. 
To  avert  naughtiness  or  any  other  disaster  from  her  chil- 
dren was  the  end  of  Frances's  existence. 

So  she  called  Michael  to  come  to  her.  He  came,  run- 
ning like  a  little  dog,  obediently. 


Michael  was  glad  that  he  had  been  sent  across  the 
Heath  to  Grannie's  house  with  a  message.  It  made  him 
feel  big  and  brave.  Besides,  it  would  put  off  the  moment 
when  Mary-Nanna  would  come  for  him,  to  make  him 
ready  for  the  party.  He  was  not  sure  that  he  wanted 
to  go  to  it. 

Michael  did  not  much  like  going  to  Grannie's  house 
either.  In  all  the  rooms  there  was  a  queer  dark-green- 
ness and  creepiness.  It  smelt  of  bird-cages  and  elder 
bushes  and  of  Grandpapa's  funeral.  And  when  you  had 
seen  Auntie  Edie's  Senegal  wax-bills,  and  the  stuffed 
fish,  and  the  inside  of  Auntie  Louie's  typewriter  there 
was  nothing  else  to  see. 

His  mother  said  that  Grandpapa's  funeral  was  all 
over,  and  that  the  green  creepiness  came  from  the  green 
creepers.  But  Michael  knew  it  didn't.  She  only  said 
things  like  that  to  make  you  feel  nice  and  comfy  when 
you  were  going  to  bed.  Michael  knew  very  well  that 
they  had  put  Grandpapa  into  the  drawing-room  and  locked 


6  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  door  so  that  the  funeral  men  shouldn't  get  at  him  and 
take  him  away  too  soon.  And  Auntie  Louie  had  kept 
the  key  in  her  pocket. 

Funerals  meant  taking  people  away. 

Old  iSTanna  wouldn't  let  him  talk  about  it;  but  Mary- 
Xanna  had  told  him  that  was  what  funerals  meant.  All 
the  same,  as  he  went  up  the  flagged  path,  he  took  care 
not  to  look  through  the  black  panes  of  the  window  where 
the  elder  bush  was,  lest  he  should  see  Grandpapa's  coffin 
standing  in  the  place  where  the  big  table  used  to  be,  and 
Grandpapa  lying  inside  it  wrapped  in  a  white  sheet. 

Michael's  message  was  that  Mummy  sent  her  love,  and 
would  Grannie  and  Auntie  Louie  and  Auntie  Emmeline 
and  Auntie  Edie  come  to  tea  ?  She  was  going  to  have 
tea  in  the  garden,  and  would  they  please  come  early  ?  As 
early  as  possible.     That  was  the  part  he  was  not  to  forget. 

The  queer  thing  was  that  when  Michael  went  to  see 
Grannie  and  the  Aunties  in  Grannie's  house  he  saw  four 
old  women.  They  wore  black  dresses  that  smelt  some- 
times of  something  sweet  and  sometimes  like  your  fingers 
when  you  get  ink  on  them.  The  Aunties  looked  cross; 
and  Auntie  Emmeline  smelt  as  if  she  had  been  crying.  He 
thought  that  perhaps  they  had  not  been  able  to  stop  cry- 
ing since  Grandpapa's  funeral.  He  thought  that  was 
why  Auntie  Louie's  nose  was  red  and  shiny  and  Auntie 
Edio's  eyelids  had  pink  edges  instead  of  lashes.  In 
Grannie's  house  they  never  let  you  do  anything.  They 
never  did  anything  themselves.  They  never  wanted  to 
do  anything;  not  even  to  talk.  He  thought  it  was  be- 
cause they  knew  that  Grandpapa  was  still  there  all  the 
time. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  7 

But  outside  it  the  Aunties  were  not  so  very  old.  They 
rode  bicycles.  And  when  they  came  to  Michael's 
Father's  house  they  forgot  all  about  Grandpapa's  funeral 
and  ran  about  and  played  tennis  like  Michael's  mother 
and  Mrs.  Jervis,  and  they  talked  a  lot. 

Michael's  mother  was  Grannie's  child.  To  see  how  she 
could  be  a  child  you  had  only  to  think  of  her  in  her 
nightgown  with  her  long  brown  hair  plaited  in  a  pig- 
tail hanging  down  her  back  and  tied  with  a  blue  ribbon. 
But  he  couldn't  see  how  the  three  Aunties  could  be  Gran- 
nie's other  children.  They  were  bigger  than  Grannie 
and  they  had  grey  hair.  Grannie  was  a  little  thing;  she 
was  white  and  dry;  and  she  had  hair  like  hay.  Besides, 
she  hardly  ever  took  any  notice  of  them  except  to  make 
a  face  at  Auntie  Emmeline  or  Auntie  Edie  now  and 
then.  She  did  it  with  her  head  a  little  on  one  side, 
pushing  out  her  underlip  and  drawing  it  back  again. 

Grannie  interested  Michael ;  but  more  when  he  thought 
about  her  than  when  she  was  actually  there.  She  stood 
for  him  as  the  mark  and  measure  of  past  time.  To  un- 
derstand how  old  Grannie  was  you  had  to  think  back- 
wards ;  this  way :  Once  there  was  a  time  when  there  was 
no  Michael ;  but  there  was  Mummy  and  there  was  Daddy. 
And  once  there  was  a  time  when  there  was  no  Mummy 
and  no  Daddy;  but  there  was  Grannie  and  there  was 
Grandpapa.  Now  there  was  no  Grandpapa.  But  he 
couldn't  think  back  far  enough  to  get  to  the  time  when 
there  was  no  Grannie. 

Michael  thought  that  being  Grannie  must  feel  like 
being  God. 


8  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Before  be  came  to  the  black  window  pane  and  tbe 
elder  bush  he  had  to  run  down  the  slopes  and  jump  the 
gullies  on  his  side  of  the  Heath,  and  cross  the  West  Road, 
and  climb  the  other  slope  to  Grannie's  side.  And  it 
was  not  till  you  got  to  the  row  of  elms  on  Judge's  Walk 
that  you  had  to  go  carefully  because  of  the  funeral. 

He  stood  there  on  the  ridge  of  the  Walk  and  looked 
back  to  his  own  side.  There  were  other  houses  there ;  but 
he  knew  his  father's  house  by  the  tree  of  Heaven  in 
the  garden. 


The  garden  stood  on  a  high,  flat  promontory  jutting 
out  into  the  Heath.  A  brown  brick  wall  with  buttresses, 
strong  like  fortifications  on  a  breastwork,  enclosed  it 
on  three  sides.  From  the  flagged  terrace  at  the  bottom 
of  the  garden  you  looked  down,  through  the  tops  of  the 
birch-trees  that  rose  against  the  rampart,  over  the  wild 
places  of  the  Heath.  There  was  another  flagged  terrace 
at  the  other  end  of  the  garden.  The  house  rose  sheer 
from  its  pavement,  brown  brick  like  the  wall,  and  flat- 
fronted,  with  the  white  wings  of  its  storm  shutters  spread 
open,  row  on  row.  It  barred  the  promontory  from  the 
mainland.  And  at  the  back  of  it,  beyond  its  kitchen 
garden  and  its  courtyard,  a  fringe  of  Heath  still  parted 
it  from  the  hill  road  that  went  from  "  Jack  Straw's 
Castle  "  to  "  The  Bull  and  Bush."  You  reached  it  by  a 
lane  that  led  from  the  road  to  the  Heath. 

The  house  belonged  to  the  Heath  and  the  open  country. 
It  was  aware  of  nothing  but  the  Heath  and  the  open 
country  between  it  and  Harrow  on  the  Hill.     It  had  the 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  9 

air  of  all  the  old  houses  of  Hampstead,  the  wonderful  air 
of  not  acknowledging  the  existence  of  Bank  Holidays. 
It  was  lifted  up  high  above  the  town;  shut  in;  utterly 
secluded. 


Anthony  Harrison  considered  that  he  had  done  well 
when  he  acquired  West  End  House  for  his  wife  Frances, 
and  for  his  children,  Dorothea,  Michael,  Nicholas  and 
John. 

Frances  had  said  that,  if  he  was  thinking  of  her,  he 
needn't  buy  a  big  place,  because  she  didn't  want  one. 
But  he  might  buy  it  for  the  children  if  he  liked.  Anthony 
had  said  that  she  had  no  idea  of  what  she  mightn't 
want,  once  she  began  to  give  her  mind  to  it,  and  that  he 
would  like  to  think  of  her  living  in  it  after  he  was  gone. 
Not  that  he  had  any  intention  of  going;  he  was  only 
thirty-six  (not  much  older  than  Frances)  and  incurably 
healthy.  But  since  his  wife's  attention  had  become  ab- 
sorbed in  the  children  —  to  the  exclusion  of  every  other 
interest  —  he  was  always  trying  to  harrow  her  by  the 
suggestion.  And  Frances  only  laughed  at  him  and  told 
him  that  he  was  a  silly  old  thing,  and  that  he  needn't 
think  he  was  going  to  get  round  her  that  way. 

There  was  no  other  way  open  for  Anthony;  unless  he 
were  to  go  bankrupt  or  get  pneumonia  or  peritonitis. 
Frances  would  have  been  the  first  to  acknowledge  that 
illness  or  misfortune  constituted  a  claim.  And  the  only 
things  he  ever  did  get  were  loud,  explosive  colds  in  his 
"head  which  made  him  a  mark  for  derision.  His  business 
was  so  sound  that  not  even  a  revolution  or  a  European 


io  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

war  could  shake  it.  And  his  appearance  was  incompati- 
ble with  his  pretensions  to  pathos. 

It  would  have  paid  him  better  to  have  been  small  and 
weedy,  or  lamentably  fat,  or  to  have  had  a  bald  place  com- 
ing, or  crow's  feet  pointing  to  grey  hairs;  for  then  there 
might  have  been  a  chance  for  him.  But  Anthony's  body 
was  well  made,  slender  and  tall.  He  had  blue  eyes  and 
black-brown  hair,  and  the  look  of  an  amiable  hawk,  alert, 
fiercely  benevolent.  Frances  couldn't  see  any  pathos  in 
the  kind  of  figure  she  happened  to  admire  most,  the  only 
kind  she  would  have  tolerated  in  a  husband.  And  if  she 
had  seen  any  pathos  in  it  she  wouldn't  have  married  it. 
Pathos,  she  said,  was  all  very  well  in  a  father,  or  a 
brother,  or  a  friend,  but  in  choosing  a  husband  you  had 
to  think  of  your  children;  and  she  had  wanted  boys  that 
would  look  like  Michael  and  Nicholas  and  John. 

"  Don't  you  mean,"  Anthony  had  said,  "  boys  that 
will  look  like  me  ?  " 

"  I  mean,"  she  had  answered,  "  exactly  what  I  say. 
Xou  needn't  be  so  arrogant." 

Her  arrogance  had  been  beyond  all  bearing  since  John, 
the  third  son,  had  been  born. 

And  it  was  Frances,  after  all,  who  had  made  him  buy 
West  End  House  for  her  own  reasons.  Both  the  day 
nursery  and  the  night  nursery  had  windows  to  the  south. 
It  was  the  kind  of  house  she  had  always  dreamed  of  liv- 
ing in,  and  of  Michael,  or  Nicky  living  in  after  she  and 
Anthony  were  gone.  It  was  not  more  than  seven  minutes' 
walk  from  the  bottom  of  the  lane  to  the  house  where  her 
people  lived.  She  had  to  think  about  the  old  people 
when  the  poor  dears  had  come  up  to  London  in  order  to 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  n 

be  thought  about.  And  it  had  white  storm  shutters  and 
a  tree  of  Heaven  in  the  garden. 

And,  because  they  had  both  decided  that  they  would 
have  that  house  whatever  happened,  they  began  to  argue 
and  to  tease  each  other.  Anthony  had  said  it  was  all 
right,  only  the  tree  of  Heaven  wasn't  a  tree  of  Heaven; 
it  was  a  common  ash.  He  was  one  of  the  biggest  timber 
merchants  in  the  country  and  he  ought  to  know.  Frances 
said  she  mightn't  know  much,  but  she  did  know  that  was 
the  kind  of  tree  the  people  down  in  her  part  of  the  coun- 
try called  a  tree  of  Heaven.  Anthony  said  he  couldn't 
help  that.  It  didn't  matter  what  they  called  it.  It  was 
a  common  ash. 

Then  she  told  him  he  had  no  poetry  in  his  composi- 
tion. She  had  always  dreamed  of  having  a  tree  of 
Heaven  in  her  garden ;  and  he  was  destroying  her  dream. 
He  replied  that  he  didn't  want  to  destroy  her  dream,  but 
the  tree  really  was  an  ash.  You  could  tell  by  the  bark, 
and  by  the  leaves  and  by  the  number  and  the  shape  of  the 
leaflets.  And  anyhow,  that  was  the  first  he'd  heard  about 
her  dream. 

"  You  don't  know,"  said  Frances,  "  what  goes  on  in- 
side me." 

She  said  that  if  any  of  the  children  developed  an  im- 
agination he  needn't  think  he  had  anything  to  do  with  it. 

"  I  shan't,"  said  Anthony.  "  I  wouldn't  have  anything 
to  do  with  it  if  I  could.  Facts  are  good  enough  for  me. 
The  children  must  be  brought  up  to  realize  facts." 

An  ash-tree  was  a  fact  and  a  tree  of  Heaven  was  a 
fancy;  unless  by  any  chance  she  meant  ailanthus  glan- 
dulosa.     (He  knew  she  didn't.)     If  she  wanted  to  know, 


12  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  buds  of  the  ash  were  black  like  ebony.  The  buds  of 
the  tree  of  Heaven  were  rose-red,  like  —  like  bad  mahog- 
any.    Wait  till  the  spring  and  look  at  the  buds. 

Frances  waited  till  the  spring  and  looked  at  the  buds, 
and,  sure  enough,  they  were  black  like  ebony. 

Anthony  also  said  that  if  they  were  choosing  a  house 
for  the  children,  it  was  no  earthly  use  to  think  about  the 
old  people.  For  the  old  people  would  go  and  the  children 
would  remain. 

As  if  to  show  how  right  he  was,  Grandpapa  had  died 
early  in  that  summer  of  'ninety-five,  one  month  after 
they  had  moved  into  West  End  House.  That  still  left 
Grannie  and  Auntie  Louie  and  Auntie  Emmeline  and 
Auntie  Edie  for  Anthony  to  look  after. 


She  was  thinking  of  them  now.  She  hoped  that  they 
would  come  early  in  time  to  see  the  children.  She  also 
hoped  that  they  would  go  early,  so  that  she  and  Anthony 
might  have  their  three  sets  of  tennis  before  dinner  in 
peace. 

There  would  be  no  peace  if  Louie  and  Edie  wanted  to 
play  too.  The  one  thing  that  Anthony  could  not  stand 
was  people  wanting  to  do  things  they  couldn't  do,  and 
spoiling  them  for  those  who  could.  He  used  to  say  that 
the  sight  of  Louie  anywhere  near  the  tennis  court  put  him 
off  his  •  stroke. 

Again,  the  faint  illusion  of  worry  was  created  by  the 
thought  that  this  dreadful  thing  might  happen,  that  Louie 
and  Edie  might  want  to  play  and  that  Anthony  would  be 
put  off  his  stroke  and  be  annoyed,  and  that  his  annoyance, 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  13 

his  just  and  legitimate  annoyance,  would  spoil  the  per- 
fection of  the  afternoon.  And  as  she  played  with  the  il- 
lusion it  made  more  real  her  tranquillity,  her  incredible 
content. 

Her  hands  were  busy  now  putting  decorative  stitches 
into  a  frock  for  John.  She  had  pushed  aside  a  novel  by 
George  Moore  and  a  volume  of  Ibsen's  plays.  She  dis- 
liked Ibsen  and  disapproved  of  George  Moore.  Her  firm, 
tight  little  character  defended  itself  against  every  form  of 
intellectual  disturbance.  A  copy  of  the  Times  had  fallen 
from  her  lap  to  her  feet.  Jane,  the  cat,  had  found  it  there, 
and,  purring  loudly,  had  trodden  it  down  into  a  bed,  and 
now  lay  on  it,  asleep.  Frances  had  informed  herself  of 
the  affairs  of  the  nation. 

At  the  bottom  of  her  mind  were  the  conviction  (pro- 
found, because  unconscious)  that  the  affairs  of  the  na- 
tion were  not  to  be  compared  for  interest  with  her  own 
affairs,  and  an  attitude  of  condescension,  as  if  she  hon- 
oured the  Times  by  reading  it  and  the  nation  by  informing 
herself  of  its  affairs;  also  the  very  distinct  impression 
that  evening  papers  were  more  attractive  than  morning 
papers.  She  would  have  admitted  that  they  owed  their 
attraction  to  the  circumstance  that  Anthony  brought 
them  home  with  him  in  his  pocket,  and  that  in  the  evening 
she  was  not  obliged  to  inform  herself  of  what  might  be 
happening.     Anthony  was  certain  to  inform  her. 

Not  that  anything  ever  did  happen.  Except  strikes; 
and  even  then,  no  sooner  did  the  features  of  the  strike 
begin  to  get  dramatic  than  they  were  instantly  submerged 
in  the  flood  of  conversation  that  was  let  loose  over  them. 
Mrs.  Anthony  pitied  the  poor  editors  and  reporters  while 


i4  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Parliament  was  sitting.  She  saw  them  as  rather  silly, 
violent  and  desperate  men,  yet  pathetic  in  their  silliness, 
violence  and  desperation,  snatching  at  divorces,  and 
breach  of  promise  cases,  and  fires  in  paraffin  shops,  as 
drowning  men  snatch  at  straws. 

Her  imagination  refused  to  picture  any  end  to  this 
state  of  things.  There  would  just  be  more  speeches  and 
more  strikes,  and  still  more  speeches,  going  on  for  ever 
and  ever  at  home;  while  foreign  affairs  and  the  British 
Empire  went  on  for  ever  and  ever  too,  with  no  connection 
between  the  two  lines  of  sequence,  and  no  likeness,  ex- 
cept that  both  somehow  went  on  and  on. 

That  was  Anthony's  view  of  England's  parliament  and 
of  her  imperial  policy;  and  it  was  Mrs.  Anthony's. 
Politics,  Anthony  said,  had  become  static;  and  he  as- 
sured Frances  that  there  was  no  likelihood  that  they  would 
ever  become  dynamic  again  —  ever. 

Anthony's  view  of  politics  was  Mrs.  Anthony's  view  of 
life. 

Nothing  ever  really  happened.  Things  did  not  change ; 
they  endured ;  they  went  on.  At  least  everything  that 
really  mattered  endured  and  went  on.  So  that  everything 
that  really  mattered  could  —  if  you  were  given  to  looking 
forward  —  be  foreseen.  A  strike  —  a  really  bad  one  — 
might  conceivably  affect  Anthony's  business,  for  a  time; 
but  not  all  the  strikes  in  the  world,  not  all  the  silly 
speeches,  not  all  the  meddling  and  muddling  of  politicians 
could  ever  touch  one  of  those  enduring  things. 

Frances  believed  in  permanence  because,  in  secret,  she 
abhorred  the  thought  of  change.  And  she  abhorred  the 
thought  of  change  because,   at  thirty-three,  she  had  got 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  15 

all  the  things  she  wanted.  But  only  for  the  last  ten 
years  out  of  the  thirty-three.  Before  that  (before  she 
was  Mrs.  Anthony),  wanting  things,  letting  it  be  known 
that  you  wanted  them,  had  meant  not  getting  them.  So 
that  it  was  incredible  how  she  had  contrived  to  get  them 
all.  She  had  not  yet  left  off  being  surprised  at  her  own 
happiness.  It  was  not  like  things  you  take  for  granted 
and  are  not  aware  of.  Frances  was  profoundly  aware  of 
it.  Her  happiness  was  a  solid,  tangible  thing.  She  knew 
where  it  resided,  and  what  it  was  made  of,  and  what  terms 
she  held  it  on.  It  depended  on  her;  on  her  truth,  her  love, 
her  loyalty;  it  was  of  the  nature  of  a  trust.  But  there 
was  no  illusion  about  it.     It  was  the  reality. 

She  denied  that  she  was  arrogant,  for  she  had  not 
taken  one  of  them  for  granted,  not  even  Dorothy;  though 
a  little  arrogance  might  have  been  excusable  in  a  woman 
who  had  borne  three  sons  and  only  one  daughter  before 
she  was  thirty-two.  Whereas  Grannie's  achievement  had 
been  four  daughters,  four  superfluous  women,  of  whom 
Anthony  had  married  one  and  supported  three. 

To  be  sure  there  was  Maurice.  But  he  was  worse  than 
superfluous,  considering  that  most  of  the  time  Anthony 
was  supporting  Maurice,  too. 

She  had  only  known  one  serious  anxiety  —  lest  her  flesh 
and  blood  should  harbour  any  of  the  blood  and  flesh  left 
over  after  Morrie  was  made.  She  had  married  Anthony 
to  drive  out  Morrie  from  the  bodies  and  souls  of  her 
children.  She  meant  that,  through  her  and  Anthony, 
Morrie  should  go,  and  Dorothea,  Michael,  Nicholas  and 
John  should  remain. 


16  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

As  Frances  looked  at  the  four  children,  her  mouth 
tightened  itself  so  as  to  undo  the  ruinous  adoration  of  her 
eyes.  She  loved  their  slender  bodies,  their  pure,  candid 
faces,  their  thick,  straight  hair  that  parted  solidly  from 
the  brush,  clean-cut  and  shining  like  sheets  of  polished 
metal,  brown  for  Dorothy,  black-brown  for  Nicholas,  red 
gold  for  Michael  and  white  gold  for  John.  She  was  glad 
that  they  were  all  made  like  that;  slender  and  clear  and 
hard,  and  that  their  very  hair  was  a  thing  of  clean  surfaces 
and  definite  edges.  She  disliked  the  blurred  outlines  of 
fatness  and  fuzziness  and  nuflmess.  The  bright  solidity 
of  their  forms  helped  her  to  her  adored  illusion,  the  illu- 
sion of  their  childhood  as  going  on,  lasting  for  ever  and 
ever. 

They  would  be  the  nicest  looking  children  at  Mrs. 
Jervis's  party.  They  would  stand  out  solid  from  the 
nuflmess  and  fuzziness  and  fatness  of  the  others.  She 
saw  people  looking  at  them.  She  heard  them  saying: 
"  Who  are  the  two  little  boys  in  brown  linen  ? " — 
"  They  are  Michael  and  Nicholas  Harrison."  The 
Tunny  Man  came  and  said :  "  Hello !  I  didn't  expect 
to  see  you  here  !  "  It  was  Michael  and  Nicholas  he  didn't 
expect  to  see;  and  the  noise  in  the  room  was  Nicky's 
darling  laughter. 

Music  played.  Michael  and  Nicholas  danced  to  the 
music.  It  was  Michael's  body  and  Nicky's  that  kept  for 
her  the  pattern  of  the  dance,  their  feet  that  beat  out  its 
measure.  Sitting  under  the  tree  of  Heaven  Frances 
could  see  Mrs.  Jervis's  party.  It  shimmered  and  clus- 
tered in  a  visionary  space  between  the  tree  and  the  bor- 
der of  blue  larkspurs  on  the  other  side  of  the  lawn.     The 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  17 

firm  figures  of  Michael  and  Nicholas  and  Dorothy  held 
it  together,  kept  it  from  being  shattered  amongst  the 
steep  blue  spires  of  the  larkspurs.  When  it  was  all  over 
they  would  still  hold  it  together,  so  that  people  would 
know  that  it  had  really  happened  and  remember  having 
been  there.  They  might  even  remember  that  Rosalind 
had  had  a  birthday. 

Frances  had  just  bestowed  this  life  after  death  on  Mrs. 
Jervis's  party  when  she  heard  Michael  saying  he  didn't 
want  to  go  to  it. 

He  had  no  idea  why  he  didn't  want  to  go  except  that  he 
didn't. 

"  What  ? "  said  Frances.  "  Not  when  Nicky  and 
Dorothy  are  going  ?  " 

He  shook  his  head.     He  was  mournful  and  serious. 

"  And  there's  going  to  be  a  Magic  Lantern  " — 

"  I  know." 

"  And  a  Funny  Man  " — 

"  I  know." 

"  And  a  Big  White  Cake  with  sugar  icing  and 
Rosalind's  name  on  it  in  pink  letters,  and  eight  can- 
dles—" 

"  I  know,  Mummy."  Michael's  under  lip  began  to 
shake. 

"  I  thought  it  was  only  little  baby  boys  that  were  silly 
and  shy." 

Michael  was  not  prepared  to  contest  the  statement.  He 
saw  it  was  the  sort  of  thing  that  in  the  circumstances  she 
was  bound  to  say.  All  the  same  his  under  lip  would  have 
gone  on  shaking  if  he  hadn't  stopped  it. 


18  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  I  thought  you  were  a  big  boy,"  said  Frances. 

"  So  I  was,  yesterday.  To-day  isn't  yesterday, 
Mummy." 

"  If  John  —  John  was  asked  to  a  beautiful  party  he 
wouldn't  be  afraid  to  go." 

As  soon  as  Michael's  under  lip  had  stopped  shaking 
his  eyelids  began.     You  couldn't  stop  your  eyelids. 

"  It's  not  afraid,  exactly,"  he  said. 

"  What  is  it,  then  ?  " 

"  It's  sort  —  sort  of  forgetting  things." 

"  What  things  ?  " 

"  I  don't  know,  Mummy.  I  think  —  it's  pieces  of  me 
that  I  want  to  remember.  At  a  party  I  can't  feel  all  of 
myself  at  once  —  like  I  do  now." 

She  loved  his  strange  thoughts  as  she  loved  his  strange 
beauty,  his  reddish  yellow  hair,  his  light  hazel  eyes  that 
were  not  hers  and  not  Anthony's. 

"  What  will  you  do,  sweetheart,  all  afternoon,  with- 
out Nicky  and  Dorothy  and  Mary-Nanna  ?  " 

"  I  don't  want  Nicky  and  Dorothy  and  Mary-Nanna. 
I  want  Myself.     I  want  to  play  with  Myself." 

She  thought :  "  Why  shouldn't  he  ?  What  right  have 
I  to  say  these  things  to  him  and  make  him  cry,  and  send 
him  to  stupid  parties  that  he  doesn't  want  to  go  to? 
After  all,  he's  only  a  little  boy." 

She  thought  of  Michael,  who  was  seven,  as  if  he  were 
younger  than  Nicholas,  who  was  only  five. 


Nicky  was  different.     You  could  never  tell  what  Mi- 
chael would  take  it  into  his  head  to  think.     You  could 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  19 

never  tell  what  Nicky  would  take  it  into  his  head  to  do. 
There  was  no  guile  in  Michael.  But  sometimes  there  was 
guile  in  Nicky.  Frances  was  always  on  the  look  out  for 
Nicky's  guile. 

So  when  Michael  remarked  that  Grannie  and  the 
Aunties  would  be  there  immediately  and  Nicky  said, 
"  Mummy,  I  think  my  ear  is  going  to  ache,"  her  answer 
was  — "  You  won't  have  to  stay  more  than  a  minute, 
darling." 

For  Nicky  lived  in  perpetual  fear  that  his  Auntie 
Louie  might  kiss  at  him. 

Dorothy  saw  her  mother's  profound  misapprehension 
and  she  hastened  to  put  it  right. 

"  It  isn't  Auntie  Louie,  Mummy.  His  ear  is  really 
aching." 

And  still  Frances  went  on  smiling.  She  knew,  and 
Nicky  knew  that,  if  a  little  boy  could  establish  the  fact  of 
earache,  he  was  absolved  from  all  social  and  family  ob- 
ligations for  as  long  as  his  affliction  lasted.  He  wouldn't 
have  to  stand  still  and  pretend  he  liked  it  while  he  was 
being  kissed  at. 

Frances  kept  her  mouth  shut  when  she  smiled,  as  if 
she  were  trying  not  to.  It  was  her  upper  lip  that  got  the 
better  of  her.  The  fine,  thin  edges  of  it  quivered  and 
twitched  and  curled.  You  would  have  said  the  very 
down  was  sensitive  to  her  thought's  secret  and  iniquitous 
play.  Her  smile  mocked  other  people's  solemnities,  her 
husband's  solemnity,  and  the  solemnity  (no  doubt  inher- 
ited) of  her  son  Michael;  it  mocked  the  demureness  and 
the  gravity  of  her  face. 

She  had  brought  her  face  close  to  Nicky's ;  and  it  was  as 


20  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

if  her  mouth  had  eyes  in  it  to  see  if  there  were  guile  in 
him. 

"  Are  you  a  little  humbug  ?  "  she  said. 

Nicky  loved  his  mother's  face.  It  never  got  excited  or 
did  silly  things  like  other  people's  faces.  It  never  got 
red  and  shiny  like  Auntie  Louie's  face,  or  hot  and  rough 
like  Auntie  Emmeline's,  or  wet  and  mizzly  like  Auntie 
Edie's.  The  softness  and  whiteness  and  dryness  of  his 
mother's  face  were  delightful  to  Nicky.  So  was  her  hair. 
It  was  cold,  with  a  funny  sort  of  coldness  that  made 
your  fingers  tingle  when  you  touched  it;  and  it  smelt 
like  the  taste  of  Brazil  nuts. 

Frances  saw  the  likeness  of  her  smile  quiver  on  Nicky's 
upper  lip.  It  broke  and  became  Nicky's  smile  that  bared 
his  little  teeth  and  curled  up  the  corners  of  his  blue  eyes. 
(His  blue  eyes  and  black  brown  hair  were  Anthony's.) 
It  wasn't  reasonable  to  suppose  that  Nicky  had  earache 
when  he  could  smile  like  that. 

"  I'm  afraid,"  she  said,  "  you're  a  little  humbug.  Run 
to  the  terrace  and  see  if  Grannie  and  the  Aunties  are 
coming." 

He  ran.  It  was  half  a  child's  run  and  half  a  full- 
grown  boy's. 

Then  Mrs.  Anthony  addressed  her  daughter. 

"  Why  did  you  say  his  ear's  aching  when  it  isn't  ?  " 

"  Because,"  said  Dorothy,  "  it  is  aching." 

She  was  polite  and  exquisite  and  obstinate,  like  An- 
thony. 

"  Nicky  ought  to  know  his  own  ear  best.  Go  and  tell 
him  he's  not  to  stand  on  the  top  of  the  wall.     And  if 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  21 

they're  coming  wave  to  them,  to  show  you're  glad  to  see 
them." 

"  But  —  Mummy  —  I'm  not." 

She  knew  it  was  dreadful  before  she  said  it.  But  she 
had  warded  oil  reproof  by  nuzzling  against  her  mother's 
cheek  as  it  tried  to  turn  away  from  her.  She  saw  her 
mother's  upper  lip  moving,  twitching.  The  sensitive 
down  stirred  on  it  like  a  dark  smudge,  a  dust  that  quivered. 
Her  own  mouth,  pushed  forward,  searching,  the  mouth  of 
a  nuzzling  puppy,  remained  grave  and  tender.  She  was 
earnest  and  imperturbable  in  her  truthfulness. 

"  Whether  you're  glad  or  not  you  must  go,"  said  Fran- 
ces.    She  meant  to  be  obeyed. 

Dorothy  went.  Her  body  was  obedient.  Tor  as  yet  she 
had  her  mother's  body  and  her  face,  her  blunted  oval,  the 
straight  nose  with  the  fine,  tilted  nostrils,  her  brown  eyes, 
her  solid  hair,  brown  on  the  top  and  light  underneath,  and 
on  the  curve  of  the  roll  above  her  little  ears.  Frances 
had  watched  the  appearance  of  those  details  with  an 
anxiety  that  would  have  surprised  her  if  she  had  been 
aware  of  it.  She  wanted  to  see  herself  in  the  bodies  of 
her  sons  and  in  the  mind  of  her  daughter.  But  Dorothy 
had  her  father's  mind.  You  couldn't  move  it.  What  she 
had  said  once  she  stuck  to  for  ever,  like  Anthony  to  his 
ash-tree.  As  if  sticking  to  a  thing  for  ever  could  make 
it  right  once.  And  Dorothy  had  formed  the  habit  of 
actually  being  right,  like  Anthony,  nine  times  out  of  ten. 
Frances  foresaw  that  this  persistence,  this  unreasoning 
rectitude,  might,  in  time,  become  annoying  in  a  daughter. 
There  were  moments  when  she  was  almost  perturbed  by 


22  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  presence  of  this  small,  mysterious  organism,  mixed  up 
of  her  body  and  her  husband's  mind. 

But  in  secret  she  admired  her  daughter's  candour,  her 
downrightness  and  straightforwardness,  her  disdain  of 
conventions  and  hypocrisies.  Frances  was  not  glad,  she 
knew  she  was  not  glad,  any  more  than  Dorothy  was  glad, 
to  see  her  mother  and  her  sisters.  She  only  pretended. 
In  secret  she  was  afraid  of  every  moment  she  would 
have  to  live  with  them.  She  had  lived  with  them  too 
long.  She  foresaw  what  would  happen  this  afternoon, 
how  they  would  look,  what  they  would  say  and  do,  and 
with  what  gestures.  It  would  be  like  the  telling,  for  the 
thirteenth  time,  of  a  dull  story  that  you  know  every 
word  of. 

She  thought  she  had  sent  them  a  kind  message.  But 
she  knew  she  had  only  asked  them  to  come  early  in  order 
that  they  might  go  early  and  leave  her  to  her  happiness. 

She  went  down  to  the  terrace  wall  where  Michael  and 
Nicky  and  Dorothy  were  watching  for  them.  She  was 
impatient,  and  she  thought  that  she  wanted  to  see  them 
coming.  But  she  only  wanted  to  see  if  they  were  coming 
early.     It  struck  her  that  this  was  sad. 


Small  and  distant,  the  four  black  figures  moved  on  the 
slope  under  the  Judges'  Walk;  four  spots  of  black  that 
crawled  on  the  sallow  grass  and  the  yellow  clay  of  the 
Heath. 

"  How  little  they  look,"  Michael  said. 

Their  littleness  and  their  distance  made  them  harmless, 
made  them  pathetic.     Frances  was  sorry  that  she  was  not 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  23 

glad.  That  was  the  difference  between  her  and  Dorothy, 
that  she  was  sorry  and  always  would  be  sorry  for  not  be- 
ing what  she  ought  to  be;  and  Dorothy  never  would  be 
sorry  for  being  what  she  was.  She  seemed  to  be  saying, 
already,  in  her  clearness  and  hardness,  "  What  I  am  I 
am,  and  you  can't  change  me."  The  utmost  you  could 
wring  from  her  was  that  she  couldn't  help  it. 

Frances's  sorrow  was  almost  unbearable  when  the  four 
women  in  black  came  nearer,  when  she  saw  them  climb- 
ing the  slope  below  the  garden  and  the  lane. 


II 

Grannie  took  a  long  time  crossing  the  lawn  from  the 
door  in  the  lane  to  the  tree  of  Heaven. 

She  came  first.  Her  daughters  followed,  forced  to  her 
slow  pace,  advancing  with  an  air  of  imperfect  cohesion, 
of  not  really  belonging  to  each  other,  as  if  they  had  been 
strangers  associated  by  some  accident.  It  had  grown  on 
them  in  their  efforts  to  carry  off  the  embarrassment  of  ap- 
pearing as  an  eternal  trio.  Auntie  Louie  carried  it  off 
best.  Sharp  and  rigid,  Auntie  Louie's  figure  never  lent 
itself  to  any  group.  But  for  her  black  gown  she  really 
might  not  have  belonged. 

Mrs.  Fleming  went  slowly,  not  because  she  was  old,  for 
she  was  only  sixty,  but  because,  though  she  said,  and 
thought,  that  she  was  wrapped  up  in  Frances  and  her 
children,  she  was  still  absorbed,  fascinated  by  her  sacred 
sense  of  bereavement.  She  moved  as  if  hypnotized  by 
her  own  sorrow. 

To  her  three  unmarried  daughters  she  behaved  with  a 
sort  of  mystic  hostility,  a  holy  detachment  and  displeas- 
ure, as  if  she  suspected  them  of  getting  over  it,  or  of 
wanting  to  get  over  it  if  they  could.  But  to  her  one  mar- 
ried daughter  and  to  her  grand-children  she  was  soft  and 
gentle.  So  that,  when  they  happened  to  be  all  together, 
her  moods  changed  so  rapidly  that  she  seemed  a  creature 
of  unaccountable  caprice.  One  minute  her  small,  white, 
dry  face  quivered  with  softness  and  gentleness,  and  the 

24 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  25 

next  it  stiffened,  or  twitched  with  the  inimical,  disapprov- 
ing look  it  had  for  Louie  and  Emmeline  and  Edith. 

The  children  lifted  up  their  pure,  impassive  faces  to 
be  kissed  at.  Old  Nanna  brought  Baby  John  and  put 
him  on  his  grandmother's  knee.  Dorothy  and  Nicholas 
went  off  with  Mary-ISTanna  to  the  party.  Michael  forgot 
all  about  playing  with  himself.  He  stayed  where  he  was, 
drawn  by  the  spectacle  of  Grannie  and  the  Aunties. 
Grannie  was  clucking  and  chuckling  to  Baby  John  as 
she  had  clucked  and  chuckled  to  her  own  babies  long  ago. 
Her  under  lip  made  itself  wide  and  full;  it  worked  with 
an  in  and  out  movement  very  funny  and  interesting  to 
Michael.  The  movement  meant  that  Grannie  chuckled 
under  protest  of  memories  that  were  sacred  to  Grandpapa. 

"  Tchoo  —  tchoo  —  tchoo  —  tchoo !  Chuckaboo !  Beau*- 
tiful  boy !  "  said  Grannie. 

Auntie  Louie  looked  at  her  youngest  nephew.  She 
smiled  her  downward,  sagging  smile,  wrung  from  a  vir- 
ginity sadder  than  Grannie's  grief.  She  spoke  to  Baby 
John. 

"  You  really  are  rather  a  nice  boy,"  Auntie  Louie 
said. 

But  Edie,  the  youngest  Auntie,  was  kneeling  on  the 
grass  before  him,  bringing  her  face  close  to  his.  Baby 
John's  new  and  flawless  face  was  cruel  to  Auntie  Edie's. 
So  was  his  look  of  dignity  and  wisdom. 

"  Oh,  she  says  you're  only  rather  nice,"  said  Auntie 
Edie.  "  And  you're  the  beautifullest,  sweetest,  darling- 
est  that  ever  was.  Wasn't  she  a  nasty  Auntie  Louie  ? 
Ten  little  pink  toes.  And  there  he  goes.  Five  little 
tootsies  to  each  of  his  footsies." 


26  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

She  bid  herself  behind  the  Times,  disturbing  Jane. 

"Where's  John-John?"  she  cried.  "Where's  he 
gone  to  ?  Can  anybody  tell  me  where  to  find  John-John  ? 
Where's  John-John  %  Peep-&o  —  there  he  is !  John- 
John,  look  at  Auntie  Edie.  Oh,  he  won't  pay  any  atten- 
tion to  poor  me." 

Baby  John  was  playing  earnestly  with  Grannie's  watch- 
chain. 

"  You  might  leave  the  child  alone,"  said  Grannie. 
"  Can't  you  see  he  doesn't  want  you  %  " 

Auntie  Edie  made  a  little  pouting  face,  like  a  scolded, 
pathetic  child.     Nobody  ever  did  want  Auntie  Edie. 

And  all  the  time  Auntie  Emmy  was  talking  to  Frances 
very  loud  and  fast. 

"  Frances,  I  do  think  your  garden's  too  beautiful  for 
words.  How  clever  of  you  to  think  of  clearing  away  the 
old  flower-beds.  I  hate  flower-beds  on  a  lawn.  Yet  I 
don't  suppose  I  should  have  had  the  strength  of  mind  to 
get  rid  of  them  if  it  had  been  me." 

As  she  talked  Auntie  Emmy  opened  her  eyes  very  wide ; 
her  eyebrows  jerked,  the  left  one  leaping  up  above  the 
right;  she  thrust  out  her  chin  at  you  and  her  long,  in- 
quiring nose.  Her  thin  face  was  the  play  of  agitated 
nerve-strings  that  pulled  it  thus  into  perpetual,  restless 
movements;  and  she  made  vague  gestures  with  her  large, 
bony  hands.  Her  tongue  went  tick-tack,  like  a  clock. 
Anthony  said  you  could  hear  Emmy's  tongue  striking  the 
roof  of  her  mouth  all  the  time. 

"  And  putting  those  delphiniums  all  together  like  that 
—  Massing  the  blues.  Anthony  %  I  do  think  Anthony 
has  perfect  taste.     I  adore  delphiniums." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  27 

Auntie  Emmy  was  behaving  as  if  neither  Michael  nor 
Baby  John  was  there. 

"  Don't  you  think  John-John's  too  beautiful  for 
words  ?  "  said  Frances.  "  Don't  you  like  him  a  little  bit 
too  ?  " 

Auntie  Emmy  winced  as  if  Frances  had  flicked  some- 
thing in  her  face. 

"  Of  course  I  like  him  too.     Why  shouldn't  I  ?  " 

"  I  don't  think  you  do,  Auntie  Emmy,"  Michael  said. 

Auntie  Emmy  considered  him  as  for  the  first  time. 

"  What  do  you  know  about  it  ?  "  she  said. 

"  I  can  tell  by  the  funny  things  your  face  does." 

"  I  thought,"  said  Frances,  "  you  wanted  to  play  by 
yourself." 

"  So  I  do,"  said  Michael. 

"  Well  then,  go  and  play." 

He  went  and  to  a  heavenly  place  that  he  knew  of.  But 
as  he  played  with  Himself  there  he  thought :  "  Auntie 
Emmy  doesn't  tell  the  truth.  I  think  it  is  because  she 
isn't  happy." 

Michael  kept  his  best  things  to  himself. 


"  I  suppose  you're  happy,"  said  Grannie,  "  now  you've 
got  the  poor  child  sent  away." 

Auntie  Emmy  raised  her  eyebrows  and  spread  out  her 
hands,  as  much  as  to  say  she  was  helpless  under  her  moth- 
er's stupidity. 

"  He'd  have  been  sent  away  anyhow,"  said  Frances. 
"  It  isn't  good  for  him  to  hang  about  listening  to  grown-up 
conversation." 


28  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

It  was  her  part  to  keep  the  peace  between  her  mother 
and  her  sisters. 

"  It  seems  to  me/'  said  Auntie  Louie,  "  that  you  began 
it  yourself." 

When  a  situation  became  uncomfortable,  Auntie  Louie 
always  put  her  word  in  and  made  it  worse.  She  never 
would  let  Frances  keep  the  peace. 

Frances  knew  what  Louie  meant  —  that  she  was  always 
flinging  her  babies  in  Emmy's  face  at  those  moments  when 
the  sight  of  other  people's  babies  was  too  much  for  Emmy. 
She  could  never  be  prepared  for  Emmy's  moments. 

"It's  all  very  well,"  Auntie  Louie  went  on;  "but  I 
should  like  to  hear  of  somebody  admiring  Dorothy.  I 
don't  see  where  Dorothy  comes  in." 

Dorothy  was  supposed,  by  the  two  Karmas,  to  be  Auntie 
Louie's  favourite.  If  you  taxed  her  with  it  she  was  in- 
dignant and  declared  that  she  was  sure  she  wasn't. 

And  again  Frances  knew  what  Louie  meant  —  that  she 
loved  her  three  sons,  Michael  and  Nicholas  and  John,  with 
passion,  and  her  one  daughter,  Dorothea,  with  critical 
affection.  That  was  the  sort  of  thing  that  Louie  was  al- 
ways saying  and  thinking  about  people,  and  nobody  ever 
paid  the  slightest  attention  to  what  Louie  said  or  thought. 
Frances  told  herself  that  if  there  was  one  emotion  that 
she  was  more  free  from  than  another  it  was  sex  jealousy. 

The  proof  of  it,  which  she  offered  now,  was  that  she  had 
given  up  Dorothy  to  Anthony.  It  was  natural  that  he 
should  care  most  for  the  little  girl. 

Louie  said  that  was  easy  —  when  she  knew  perfectly 
well  that  Anthony  didn't.  Like  Frances  he  cared  most 
for  his  three  sons.     She  was  leaving  Dorothy  to  Anthony 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  29 

so  that  Anthony  might  leave  Michael  and  Nicholas  to  her. 

"  You  might  just  as  well  say,"  Frances  said,  "  that  I'm 
in  love  with  John- John.     Poor  little  Don-Don !  " 

"  I  might,"  said  Louie,  "  just  as  well." 

Grannie  said  she  was  sure  she  didn't  understand  what 
they  were  talking  about  and  that  Louie  had  some  very 
queer  ideas  in  her  head. 

"  Louie,"  she  said,  "  knows  more  than  I  do." 

Frances  thought:  Was  Grannie  really  stupid?  Was 
she  really  innocent  ?  Was  she  not,  rather,  clever,  chock- 
full  of  the  secret  wisdom  and  the  secret  cruelty  of  sex  ? 

Frances  was  afraid  of  her  thoughts.  They  came  to  her, 
not  like  thoughts,  but  like  quick  rushes  of  her  blood,  partly 
confusing  her.     She  did  not  like  that. 

She  thought :  Supposing  Grannie  knew  all  the  time  that 
Emmy  was  unhappy,  and  took  a  perverse  pleasure  in  her 
knowledge  ?  Supposing  she  was  not  really  soft  and  gen- 
tle ?  She  could  be  soft  and  gentle  to  her,  because  of  her 
children  and  because  of  Anthony.  She  respected  An- 
thony because  he  was  well-off  and  efficient  and  successful, 
and  had  supported  her  ever  since  Grandpapa  had  gone 
bankrupt.  She  was  proud  of  Frances  because  she  was 
Anthony's  wife,  who  had  had  three  sons  and  only  one 
daughter. 

Grannie  behaved  as  if  her  grandchildren  were  her  own 
children,  as  if  she  had  borne  three  sons  and  only  one 
daughter,  instead  of  four  daughters  and  only  one  son. 
Still,  Frances  was  the  vehicle  of  flesh  and  blood  that  car- 
ried on  her  flesh  and  blood  in  Michael  and  Nicholas  and 
John.     She  respected  Frances. 

But  Frances  could  remember  a  time  when  she  had  been 


30  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

unmarried  like  her  sisters,  and  when  Grannie  had  turned 
on  her,  too,  that  look  that  was  half  contempt  and  half 
hostility  or  displeasure.  Grannie  had  not  wanted  her  to 
marry  Anthony,  any  more  than  she  would  have  wanted 
Louie  or  Emmeline  or  Edith  to  marry  anybody,  supposing 
anybody  had  wanted  to  marry  them.  And  Frances  and 
Anthony  had  defied  her.  They  had  insisted  on  marrying 
each  other.  Frances  knew  that  if  there  had  been  no  An- 
thony, her  mother  would  have  despised  her  in  secret,  as  in 
secret  she  despised  Emmeline  and  Edith.  She  despised 
them  more  than  Louie,  because,  poor  things,  they  wanted, 
palpably,  to  be  married,  whereas  Louie  didn't,  or  said  she 
didn't.  In  her  own  way,  Louie  had  defied  her  mother. 
She  had  bought  a  type-writer  and  a  bicycle  with  her  own 
earnings,  and  by  partially  supporting  herself  she  had  de- 
fied Anthony,  the  male  benefactor.  Louie's  manner  inti- 
mated that  there  was  nothing  Frances  had  that  she  wanted. 
She  had  resources  in  herself,  and  Frances  had  none. 

Frances  persuaded  herself  that  she  admired  and  re- 
spected Louie.  She  knew  that  she,  Frances,  was  only 
admired  and  respected  because  she  had  succeeded  where 
her  three  sisters  had  failed.  She  was  even  afraid  that,  in 
moments  of  exasperation,  Grannie  used  her  and  Anthony 
and  the  children  to  punish  Emmy  and  Edie  for  their 
failure.  The  least  she  could  do  was  to  stand  between 
them  and  Grannie. 

It  was  possible  that  if  Grannie  had  been  allowed  to 
ignore  them  and  give  her  whole  attention  to  Frances  or 
Michael  or  Baby  John,  she  could  have  contrived  to  be 
soft  and  gentle  for  an  afternoon.  But  neither  Louie  nor 
Emmeline,  nor  even  Edith,  would  consent  to  be  ignored. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  31 

They  refused  to  knuckle  under,  to  give  in.  Theirs  was 
a  perpetual  struggle  to  achieve  an  individuality  in  the 
teeth  of  circumstances  that  had  denied  them  any.  Fran- 
ces acknowledged  that  they  were  right,  that  in  the  same 
circumstances  she  would  have  done  the  same. 

In  their  different  ways  and  by  different  methods  they 
claimed  attention.  They  claimed  it  incessantly,  Louie, 
the  eldest,  by  an  attitude  of  assurance  and  superiority  so 
stiff  and  hard  that  it  seemed  invulnerable ;  Emmy  by  sud- 
den jerky  enthusiasms,  exaltations,  intensities ;  Edie  by  an 
exaggerated  animation,  a  false  excitement.  Edie  would 
drop  from  a  childish  merriment  to  a  childish  pathos, 
when  she  would  call  herself  "  Poor  me,"  and  demand 
pity  for  being  tired,  for  missing  a  train,  for  cold  feet,  for 
hair  coming  down. 

There  would  be  still  more  animation,  and  still  more  en- 
thusiasm when  Anthony  came  home. 

Frances  prided  herself  on  her  power  of  foreseeing 
things.  She  foresaw  that  Anthony  would  come  home 
early  for  his  game.  She  foresaw  the  funny,  nervous 
agony  of  his  face  when  he  appeared  on  the  terrace  and 
caught  sight  of  Grannie  and  the  three  Aunties,  and  the 
elaborate  and  exquisite  politeness  with  which  he  would 
conceal  from  them  his  emotion.  She  foresaw  that  she 
would  say  to  Annie,  "  When  the  master  comes  tell  him 
we're  having  tea  in  the  garden,  under  the  tree  of  —  under 
the  ash-tree  "  (for  after  all,  he  was  the  master,  and  disci- 
pline must  be  maintained).  She  foresaw  the  very  ges- 
tures of  his  entrance,  the  ironically  solemn  bow  that  he 
would  make  to  her,  far-off,  from  the  terrace;  she  even 
foresaw  the  kind  of  joke  that,  for  the  life  of  him,  he 


32  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

would  not  be  able  to  help  making.  She  was  so  made  that 
she  could  live  happily  in  this  world  of  small,  foreseen 
things. 


Ill 

And  it  all  happened  as  she  had  foreseen. 

Anthony  came  home  early,  because  it  was  a  fine  after- 
noon. He  made  the  kind  of  joke  that  calamity  always 
forced  from  him,  by  some  perversion  of  his  instincts. 

"  When  is  an  ash-tree  not  an  ash-tree  ?  When  it's  a 
tree  of  Heaven." 

He  was  exquisitely  polite  to  Grannie  and  the  Aunties, 
and  his  manner  to  Frances,  which  she  openly  complained 
of,  was,  he  said,  what  a  woman  brought  on  herself  when 
she  reserved  her  passion  for  her  children,  her  sentiment 
for  trees  of  Heaven,  and  her  mockery  for  her  devoted 
husband. 

"  I  suppose  we  can  have  some  tennis  now,"  said  Auntie 
Louie. 

"  Certainly,"  said  Anthony,  "  we  can,  and  we  shall." 
He  tried  not  to  look  at  Frances. 

And  Auntie  Edie  became  automatically  animated. 

"  I  can't  serve  for  nuts,  but  I  can  run.  Who's  going 
to  play  with  me  ?  " 

"  I  am,"  said  Anthony.     He  was  perfect. 

The  game  of  tennis  had  an  unholy  and  terrible  attrac- 
tion for  Auntie  Louie  and  Auntie  Edie.  Neither  of  them 
could  play.  But,  whereas  Auntie  Louie  thought  that  she 
could  play  and  took  tennis  seriously,  Auntie  Edie  knew 
that  she  couldn't  and  took  it  as  a  joke. 

Auntie  Louie  stood  tall  and  rigid  and  immovable.     She 

33 


34  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

planted  herself,  like  a  man,  close  up  to  the  net,  where 
Anthony  wanted  to  be,  and  where  he  should  have  been ; 
but  Auntie  Louie  said  she  was  no  good  if  you  put  her  to 
play  back;  she  couldn't  be  expected  to  take  every  ball  he 
missed. 

When  Auntie  Louie  called  out  "  Play !  "  she  meant  to 
send  a  nervous  shudder  through  her  opponents,  shattering 
their  morale.  She  went  through  all  the  gestures  of  an 
annihilating  service  that  for  some  reason  never  hap- 
pened. She  said  the  net  was  too  low  and  that  spoiled  her 
eye.  And  when  she  missed  her  return  it  was  because  An- 
thony had  looked  at  her  and  put  her  off.  Still  Aunt 
Louie's  attitude  had  this  advantage  that  it  kept  her  quiet 
in  one  place  where  Anthony  could  dance  round  and  round 
her. 

But  Auntie  Edie  played  in  little  nervous  runs  and  slides 
and  rushes ;  she  flung  herself,  with  screams  of  excitement, 
against  the  ball,  her  partner  and  the  net;  and  she  bran- 
dished her  racket  in  a  dangerous  manner.  The  oftener  she 
missed  the  funnier  it  was  to  Auntie  Edie.  She  had  been 
pretty  when  she  was  young,  and  seventeen  years  ago  her 
cries  and  tumbles  and  collisions  had  been  judged  amusing; 
and  Auntie  Edie  thought  they  were  amusing  still.  An- 
thony had  never  had  the  heart  to  undeceive  her.  So 
that  when  Anthony  was  there  Auntie  Edie  still  went  about 
setting  a  standard  of  gaiety  for  other  people  to  live  up  to ; 
and  still  she  was  astonished  that  they  never  did,  that 
other  people  had  no  sense  of  humour. 

Therefore  Frances  was  glad  when  Anthony  told  her 
that  he  had  asked  Mr.  Parsons,  the  children's  tutor,  and 
young  Norris  and  young  Vereker  from  the  office  to  come 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  35 

round  for  tennis  at  six,  and  that  dinner  must  be  put  off 
till  half-past  eight. 

All  was  well.  The  evening  would  be  sacred  to  An- 
thony and  the  young  men.  The  illusion  of  worry  passed, 
and  Frances's  real  world  of  happiness  stood  firm. 


And  as  Frances's  mind,  being  a  thoroughly  healthy 
mind,  refused  to  entertain  any  dreary  possibility  for  long 
together,  so  it  was  simply  unable  to  foresee  downright 
calamity,  even  when  it  had  been  pointed  out  to  her.  For 
instance,  that  Kicky  should  really  have  chosen  the  day 
of  the  party  for  an  earache,  the  worst  earache  he  had 
ever  had. 

He  appeared  at  tea-time,  carried  in  Mary-Nanna's  arms, 
and  with  his  head  tied  up  in  one  of  Mr.  Jervis's  cricket 
scarves.  As  he  approached  his  family  he  tried  hard  not 
to  look  pathetic. 

And  at  the  sight  of  her  little  son  her  whole  brilliant 
world  of  happiness  was  shattered  around  Frances. 

"  Nicky  darling,"  she  said,  "  why  didn't  you  tell  me 
it  was  really  aching  ?  " 

"  I  didn't  know,"  said  Nicky. 

He  never  did  know  the  precise  degree  of  pain  that 
distinguished  the  beginning  of  a  genuine  earache  from 
that  of  a  sham  one,  and  he  felt  that  to  palm  off  a  sham  ear- 
ache on  his  mother  for  a  real  one,  was  somehow  a  sneaky 
thing  to  do.  And  while  his  ear  went  on  stabbing  him, 
Nicky  did  his  best  to  explain. 

"  You  see,  I  never  know  whether  it's  aching  or  whether 
it's  only  going  to  ache.     It  began  a  little,  teeny  bit  when 


36  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  Funny  Man  made  me  laugh.  And  I  didn't  see  the 
Magic  Lantern,  and  I  didn't  have  any  of  Rosalind's  cake. 
It  came  on  when  I  was  biting  the  sugar  off.  And  it  was 
aching  in  both  ears  at  once.  It  was,"  said  Nicky,  "  a 
jolly  sell  for  me." 

At  that  moment  Nicky's  earache  jabbed  upwards  at 
his  eyelids  and  cut  them,  and  shook  tears  out  of  them. 
But  Nicky's  mouth  refused  to  take  any  part  in  the  per- 
formance, though  he  let  his  father  carry  him  upstairs. 
And,  as  he  lay  on  the  big  bed  in  his  mother's  room,  he 
said  he  thought  he  could  bear  it  if  he  had  Jane-Pussy  to 
lie  beside  him,  and  his  steam-engine. 

Anthony  went  back  into  the  garden  to  fetch  Jane.  He 
spent  an  hour  looking  for  her,  wandering  in  utter  misery 
through  the  house  and  through  the  courtyard  and  stables 
and  the  kitchen  garden.  He  looked  for  Jane  in  the  hot- 
house and  the  cucumber  frames,  and  under  the  rhubarb, 
and  on  the  scullery  roof,  and  in  the  water  butt.  It  was 
just  possible  that  on  a  day  of  complete  calamity  Jane 
should  have  slithered  off  the  scullery  roof  into  the  water- 
butt.  The  least  he  could  do  was  to  find  Jane,  since  Nicky 
wanted  her. 

And  in  the  end  it  turned  out  that  Jane  had  been  cap- 
tured in  her  sleep,  treacherously,  by  Auntie  Emmy.  And 
she  had  escaped,  maddened  with  terror  of  the  large,  nerv- 
ous, incessantly  caressing  hands.  She  had  climbed  into 
the  highest  branch  of  the  tree  of  Heaven,  and  crouched 
there,  glaring,  unhappy. 

"Damn  the  cat!  "  said  Anthony  to  himself.  (It  was 
not  Jane  he  meant.) 

He  was  distressed,  irritated,  absurdly  upset,  because  he 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  37 

would  have  to  go  back  to  Nicky  without  Jane,  because  he 
couldn't  get  Nicky  what  he  wanted. 

In  that  moment  Anthony  loved  Nicky  more  than  any  of 
them.  He  loved  him  almost  more  than  Frances.  Nicky's 
earache  ruined  the  fine  day. 

He  confided  in  young  Vereker.  "  I  wouldn't  bother," 
he  said,  "  if  the  little  chap  wasn't  so  plucky  about  it." 

"  Quite  so,  sir,"  said  young  Vereker. 


It  was  young  Mr.  Vereker  who  found  Jane,  who  even- 
tually recaptured  her.  Young  Mr.  Vereker  made  himself 
glorious  by  climbing  up,  at  the  risk  of  his  neck  and  in  his 
new  white  flannels,  into  the  high  branches  of  the  tree  of 
Heaven,  to  bring  Jane  down. 

And  when  Anthony  thanked  him  he  said,  "  Don't  men- 
tion it,  sir.  It's  only  a  trifle,"  though  it  was,  as  Mr. 
Norris  said,  palpable  that  the  flannels  were  ruined.  Still, 
if  he  hadn't  found  that  confounded  cat,  they  would  never, 
humanly  speaking,  have  had  their  tennis. 

The  Aunties  did  not  see  Mr.  Vereker  climbing  into 
the  tree  of  Heaven.  They  did  not  see  him  playing  with 
Mr.  Parsons  and  Anthony  and  Mr.  Norris.  For  as  soon 
as  the  three  young  men  appeared,  and  Emmeline  and  Edith 
began  to  be  interested  and  emphatic,  Grannie  said  that  as 
they  wouldn't  see  anything  more  of  Frances  and  the  chil- 
dren, it  was  no  good  staying  any  longer,  and  they'd 
better  be  getting  back.  It  was  as  if  she  knew  that  they 
were  going  to  enjoy  themselves  and  was  determined  to 
prevent  it. 

Frances  went  with  them  to  the  bottom  of  the  lane.     She 


38  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

stood  there  till  the  black  figures  had  passed,  one  by  one, 
through  the  white  posts  on  to  the  Heath,  till,  in  the  dis- 
tance, they  became  small  again  and  harmless  and  pathetic. 
Then  she  went  back  to  her  room  where  Nicky  lay  in  the 
big  bed. 


Nicky  lay  in  the  big  bed  with  Jane  on  one  side  of  him 
and  his  steam-engine  on  the  other,  and  a  bag  of  hot  salt 
against  each  ear.  Now  and  then  a  thin  wall  of  sleep  slid 
between  him  and  his  earache. 

Frances  sat  by  the  open  window  and  looked  out  into 
the  garden  where  Anthony  and  Norris  played,  quietly 
yet  fiercely,  against  Vereker  and  Parsons.  Frances  loved 
the  smell  of  fresh  grass  that  the  balls  and  the  men's  feet 
struck  from  the  lawn ;  she  loved  the  men's  voices  subdued 
to  Nicky's  sleep,  and  the  sound  of  their  padding  feet,  the 
thud  of  the  balls  on  the  turf,  the  smacking  and  thwacking 
of  the  rackets.  She  loved  every  movement  of  Anthony's 
handsome,  energetic  body;  she  loved  the  quick,  supple 
bodies  of  the  young  men,  the  tense  poise  and  earnest  ac- 
tivity of  their  adolescence.  But  it  was  not  Vereker  or 
Parsons  or  Norris  that  she  loved  or  that  she  saw.  It 
was  Michael,  Nicholas  and  John  whose  adolescence  was 
foreshadowed  in  those  athletic  forms  wearing  white  flan- 
nels ;  Michael,  Nicky  and  John,  in  white  flannels,  playing 
fiercely.  When  young  Vereker  drew  himself  to  his  full 
height,  when  his  young  body  showed  lean  and  slender  as  he 
raised  his  arms  for  his  smashing  service,  it  was  not  young 
Vereker,  but  Michael,  serious  and  beautiful.  When  young 
Parsons  leaped  high  into  the  air  and  thus  returned  An- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  39 

thony's  facetious  sky-scraper  on  the  volley,  that  was  Nicky. 
When  young  Norris  turned  and  ran  at  the  top  of  his 
speed,  and  overtook  the  ball  on  its  rebound  from  the 
base  line  where  young  Vereker  had  planted  it,  when,  as 
by  a  miracle,  he  sent  it  backwards  over  his  own  head, 
paralysing  Vereker  and  Parsons  with  sheer  astonishment, 
tbat  was  John. 


Her  vision  passed.  She  was  leaning  over  Nicky  now, 
Nicky  so  small  in  the  big  bed.     Nicky  had  moaned. 

"  Does  it  count  if  I  make  that  little  noise,  Mummy  ? 
It  sort  of  lets  the  pain  out." 

"  No,  my  lamb,  it  doesn't  count.  Is  the  pain  very 
bad?" 

"  Yes,  Mummy,  awful.  It's  going  faster  and  faster. 
And  it  bizzes.  And  when  it  doesn't  bizz,  it  thumps."  He 
paused  —  "I  think  —  p'raps  —  I  could  bear  it  better 
if  I  sat  on  your  knee." 

Frances  thought  she  could  bear  it  better  too.  It  would 
be  good  for  Nicky  that  he  should  grow  into  beautiful 
adolescence  and  a  perfect  manhood;  but  it  was  better  for 
her  that  he  should  be  a  baby  still,  that  she  should  have 
him  on  her  knee  and  hold  him  close  to  her;  that  she 
should  feel  his  adorable  body  press  quivering  against  her 
body,  and  the  heat  of  his  earache  penetrating  her  cool 
flesh.  For  now  she  was  lost  to  herself  and  utterly  ab- 
sorbed in  Nicky.  And  her  agony  became  a  sort  of  ecstasy, 
as  if,  actually,  she  bore  his  pain. 

It  was  Anthony  who  could  not  stand  it.  Anthony  had 
come  in  on  his  way  to  his  dressing-room.     As  he  looked 


4o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

at  Nicky  his  handsome,  hawk-like  face  was  drawn  with 
a  dreadful,  yearning,  ineffectual  pity.  Frances  had  dis- 
covered that  her  husband  could  both  be  and  look  pathetic. 
He  had  wanted  her  to  be  sorry  for  him  and  she  was  sorry 
for  him,  because  his  male  pity  was  all  agony;  there  was 
no  ecstasy  in  it  of  any  sort  at  all.  Nicky  was  far  more 
her  flesh  and  blood  than  he  was  Anthony's. 

Nicky  stirred  in  his  mother's  lap.  He  raised  his  head. 
And  when  he  saw  that  queer  look  on  his  father's  face  he 
smiled  at  it.  He  had  to  make  the  smile  himself,  for  it 
refused  to  come  of  its  own  accord.  He  made  it  care- 
fully, so  that  it  shouldn't  hurt  him.  But  he  made  it  so 
well  that  it  hurt  Frances  and  Anthony. 

"  I  never  saw  a  child  bear  pain  as  Nicky  does,"  Frances 
said  in  her  pride. 

"  If  he  can  bear  it,  I  can't,"  said  Anthony.  And  he 
stalked  into  his  dressing-room  and  shut  the  door  on  him- 
self. 

"  Daddy  minds  more  than  you  do,"  said  Frances. 

At  that  Nicky  sat  up.  His  eyes  glittered  and  his  cheeks 
burned  with  the  fever  of  his  earache. 

"  I  don't  mind,"  he  said.  "  Really  and  truly  I  don't 
mind.     I  don't  care  if  my  ear  does  ache. 

"  It's  my  eyes  is  crying,  not  me." 


At  nine  o'clock,  when  they  were  all  sitting  down  to  din- 
ner, Nicky  sent  for  his  father  and  mother.  Something 
had  happened. 

Crackers,  he  said,  had  been  going  off  in  his  ears,  and 
they  hurt  most  awfully.     And  when  it  had  done  cracking 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  41 

his  earache  had  gone  away.  And  Dorothy  had  brought 
him  a  trumpet  from  Rosalind's  party  and  Michael  a  tin 
train.  And  Michael  had  given  him  the  train  and  he 
wouldn't  take  the  trumpet  instead.  Oughtn't  Michael 
to  have  had  the  trumpet  ? 

And  when  they  left  him,  tucked  up  in  his  cot  in  the 
night  nursery,  he  called  them  back  again. 

"  It  was  a  jolly  sell  for  me,  wasn't  it  ?  "  said  Nicky. 
And  he  laughed. 


IV 

It  seemed  that  Nicky  would  always  be  like  that.  What- 
ever happened,  and  something  was  generally  happening 
to  him,  he  didn't  care.  When  he  scaled  the  plaster  flower- 
pot on  the  terrace,  and  it  gave  way  under  his  assault 
and  threw  him  down  the  steps  on  to  the  gravel  walk,  he 
picked  himself  up,  displaying  a  forehead  that  wras  a  red 
abrasion  filled  in  with  yellow  gravel  and  the  grey  dust 
of  the  smashed  flower-pot,  and  said  "  I  don't  care.  I  liked 
it,"  before  anybody  had  time  to  pity  him.  When  Mary- 
Nanna  stepped  on  his  train  and  broke  the  tender,  he  said 
"  It's  all  right.  I  don't  care.  I  shall  make  another." 
It  was  no  use  Grannie  saying,  "  Don't  care  came  to  a 
bad  end  " ;  Nicky  made  it  evident  that  a  bad  end  would 
be  life's  last  challenge  not  to  care.  No  accident,  how- 
ever unforeseen,  would  ever  take  him  at  a  disadvantage. 

Two  years  passed  and  he  was  just  the  same. 

Frances  and  Anthony  agreed  behind  his  back  that  Nicky 
was  adorable. 

But  his  peculiar  attitude  to  misfortune  became  embar- 
rassing when  you  had  to  punish  him.  Nicky  could  break 
the  back  of  any  punishment  by  first  admitting  that  it  was 
a  good  idea  and  then  thinking  of  a  better  one  when  it 
was  too  late.  It  was  a  good  idea  not  letting  him  have  any 
cake  for  tea,  after  he  had  tested  the  resilience  of  the  new 
tyres  on  his  father's  bicycle  with  a  penknife ;  but,  Nicky 

43 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  43 

said,  it  would  have  been  more  to  the  purpose  if  they  had 
taken  his  steam-engine  from  him  for  a  week. 

"  You  didn't  think  of  that,  did  you,  Mummy  ?  / 
thought  of  it,"  said  Nicky. 

Once  he  ran  away  over  the  West  Heath,  and  got  into 
the  Leg  of  Mutton  Pond,  and  would  have  been  drowned 
if  a  total  stranger  hadn't  gone  in  after  him  and  pulled 
him  out.  That  time  Nicky  was  sent  to  bed  at  four  o'clock 
in  the  afternoon.  At  seven,  when  his  mother  came  to 
tuck  him  up  and  say  Good-night,  she  found  him  sitting  up, 
smiling  and  ready. 

"  Mummy,"  he  said,  "  I  think  I  ought  to  tell  you. 
It  isn't  a  bit  of  good  sending  me  to  bed." 

"  I  should  have  thought  it  was,  myself,"  said  Trances. 
She  almost  suspected  Nicky  of  insincerity. 

"  So  it  would  have  been,"  he  assented,  "  if  I  didn't 
'vent  things.  You  see,  I  just  lie  still  'venting  things  all 
the  time.  I've  'vented  three  things  since  tea:  a  thing  to 
make  Daddy's  bikesickle  stand  still  with  Daddy  on  it; 
a  thing  to  squeeze  corks  out  of  bottles ;  and  a  thing  to 
make  my  steam-engine  go  faster.  That  isn't  a  punish- 
ment, is  it,  Mummy  ?  " 


They  said  that  Nicky  would  grow  out  of  it.  But  two 
more  years  passed  and  Nicky  was  still  the  same. 

And  yet  he  was  not  the  same.  And  Dorothy,  and 
Michael  and  John  were  not  the  same. 

For  the  awful  thing  about  your  children  was  that  they 
were  always  dying.  Yes,  dying.  The  baby  Nicky  was 
dead.     The  child  Dorothy  was  dead  and  in  her  place  was 


44  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

a  strange  big  girl.  The  child  Michael  was  dead  and  in 
his  place  was  a  strange  big  boy.  And  Frances  mourned 
over  the  passing  of  each  age.  You  could  no  more  bring 
back  that  unique  loveliness  of  two  years  old,  of  five  years 
old,  of  seven,  than  you  could  bring  back  the  dead.  Even 
John- John  was  not  a  baby  any  more;  he  spoke  another 
language  and  had  other  feelings;  he  had  no  particular 
affection  for  his  mother's  knee.  Trances  knew  that  all 
this  dying  was  to  give  place  to  a  more  wonderful  and 
a  stronger  life.  But  it  was  not  the  same  life;  and  she 
wanted  to  have  all  their  lives  about  her,  enduring,  going 
on,  at  the  same  time.  She  did  not  yet  know  that  the 
mother  of  babies  and  the  mother  of  boys  and  girls  must 
die  if  the  mother  of  men  and  women  is  to  be  born. 

Thoughts  came  to  Frances  now  that  troubled  her  tran- 
quillity. 

Supposing,  after  all,  the  children  shouldn't  grow  up 
as  she  wanted  them  to? 

There  was  Nicky.  She  could  do  nothing  with  him; 
she  could  make  no  impression  on  him. 

There  was  Michael.  She  couldn't  make  him  out.  He 
loved  them,  and  showed  that  he  loved  them ;  but  it  was  by 
caresses,  by  beautiful  words,  by  rare,  extravagant  acts 
of  renunciation,  inconsistent  with  his  self-will;  not  by 
anything  solid  and  continuous.  There  was  a  softness  in 
Michael  that  distressed  and  a  hardness  that  perplexed  her. 
You  could  make  an  impression  on  Michael  —  far  too 
easily  —  and  the  impression  stayed.  You  couldn't  ob- 
literate it.  Michael's  memory  was  terrible.  And  he  had 
secret  ways.  He  was  growing  more  and  more  sensitive, 
more    and    more    wrapped    up    in    Himself.     Supposing 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  45 

Michael  became  a  morbid  egoist,  like  Anthony's  brother, 
Bartholomew  ? 

And  there  was  Dorothy.  She  went  her  own  way  more 
than  ever,  with  the  absolute  conviction  that  it  was  the 
right  way.  Nothing  could  turn  her.  At  thirteen  her 
body  was  no  longer  obedient.  Dorothy  was  not  going  to 
be  her  mother's  companion,  or  her  father's,  either;  she 
was  Kosalind  Jervis's  companion.  She  seemed  to  care 
more  about  little  fat,  fluffy  Rosalind  than  about  any  of 
them  except  Nicky.  Dorothy  was  interested  in  Michael ; 
she  respected  his  queer  thoughts.  It  was  as  if  she  rec- 
ognized some  power  in  him  that  could  beat  her  some- 
where some  day,  and  was  humble  before  a  thing  her  clever- 
ness had  failed  to  understand.  But  it  was  Nicky  that 
she  adored,  not  Michael;  and  she  was  bad  for  Nicky. 
She  encouraged  his  naughtiness  because  it  amused  her. 

Frances  foresaw  that  a  time  would  come,  a  little  later, 
when  Nicky  and  Dorothy  would  be  companions,  not  Nicky 
and  his  mother. 

In  the  evenings,  coming  home  from  the  golf-links, 
Frances  and  Anthony  discussed  their  children. 

Frances  said,  "  You  can't  make  any  impression  on 
Nicky.  There  seems  to  be  no  way  that  you  can  get  at 
him." 

Anthony  thought  there  was  a  way.  It  was  a  way  he 
had  not  tried  yet,  that  he  did  not  want  to  try.  But,  if  he 
could  only  bring  himself  to  it,  he  judged  that  he  could 
make  a  distinct  impression. 

"  What  the  young  rascal  wants  is  a  thorough  good 
spanking,"  said  Anthony. 

Nicky  said  so  too. 


46  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

The  first  time  he  got  it  Nicky's  criticism  was  that  it 
wasn't  a  bad  idea  if  his  father  could  have  pulled  it  off  all 
right.  But  he  said,  "  It's  no  good  if  you  do  it  through 
the  cloth.  And  it's  no  good  unless  you  want  to  hurt  me, 
Daddy.  And  you  don't  want.  And  even  if  you  did  want, 
badly  enough  to  try  and  hurt,  supposing  you  spanked  ever 
so  hard,  you  couldn't  hurt  as  much  as  my  earache.  And 
I  can  bear  that." 

"  He's  top  dog  again,  you  see,"  said  Frances,  not  with- 
out a  secret  satisfaction. 

"  Oh,  is  he  ? "  said  Anthony.  "  I  don't  propose  to  be 
downed  by  Nicky." 

Every  instinct  in  him  revolted  against  spanking  Nicky. 
But  when  Williams,  the  groom,  showed  him  a  graze  on 
each  knee  of  the  pony  he  had  bought  for  Frances  and 
the  children,  Anthony  determined  that,  this  time,  Nicky 
should  have  a  serious  spanking. 

"  Which  of  them  took  Roger  out  ?  " 

"  I'm  sure  I  don't  know,  sir,"  said  Williams. 

But  Anthony  knew.  He  lay  in  wait  for  Nicky  by  the 
door  that  led  from  the  stable  yard  into  the  kitchen  garden. 

Nicky  was  in  the  strawberry  bed. 

"  Was  it  you  who  took  Roger  out  this  afternoon  ?  " 

Nicky  did  not  answer  promptly.  His  mouth  was  still 
full  of  strawberries. 

"  What  if  I  did  ?  "  he  said  at  last,  after  manifest  reflec- 
tion. 

"  If  you  did  ?  Why,  you  let  him  down  on  Goldcrs 
Hill  and  cut  his  knees." 

"  Holly  Mount,"  said  Nicky. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  47 

"  Holly  Mount  or  Golders  Hill,  it's  all  the  same  to 
you,  you  young  monkey." 

"  It  isn't,  Daddy.  Holly  Mount's  much  the  worst. 
It's  an  awful  hill." 

"  That,"  said  Anthony,  "  is  why  you're  forbidden  to 
ride  down  it.     You've  got  to  be  spanked  for  this,  Nicky." 

"  Have  I  ?     All  right.     Don't  look  so  unhappy,  Daddy." 

Anthony  did  much  better  this  time.  Nicky  (though 
he  shook  with  laughter)  owned  it  very  handsomely.  And 
Anthony  had  handicapped  himself  again  by  doing  it 
through  the  cloth.  He  drew  the  line  at  shaming  Nicky. 
(Yet  —  could  you  have  shamed  his  indomitable  impu- 
dence?) 

But  he  had  done  it.  He  had  done  it  ruthlessly,  while 
the  strawberries  were  still  wet  on  Nicky's  mouth. 

And  when  it  was  all  over  Michael,  looking  for  his 
father,  came  into  the  school-room  where  these  things  hap- 
pened. He  said  he  was  awfully  sorry,  but  he'd  taken 
Roger  out,  and  Roger  had  gone  down  on  his  knees  and 
cut  himself. 

No,  it  wasn't  on  Holly  Mount,  it  was  at  the  turn  of  the 
road  on  the  hill  past  the  "  Spaniards." 

Anthony  paid  no  attention  to  Michael.  He  turned  on 
Michael's  brother. 

"  Nicky,  what  did  you  do  it  for  ?  " 

"  For  a  rag,  of  course.  I  knew  you'd  feel  such  a  jolly 
fool  when  you  found  it  wasn't  me." 

"  You  see,  Daddy,"  he  explained  later,  "  you  might  have 
known  I  wouldn't  have  let  Roger  down.  But  wasn't  it 
a  ripping  sell  ?  " 


48  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  What  are  you  to  do,"  said  Anthony,  "  with  a  hoy 
like  that  ?  " 

Frances  had  an  inspiration.     "  Do  nothing,"  she  said. 

Her  tranquillity  refused  to  be  troubled  for  long  to- 
gether. 

"  Nicky's  right.  It's  no  good  trying  to  punish  him. 
After  all,  why  punish  Nicky  ?  It  isn't  as  if  he  was  really 
naughty.  He  never  does  unkind  things,  or  mean  things. 
And  he's  truthful." 

"  Horribly  truthful.     They  all  are,"  said  Anthony. 

"  Well,  then,  what  does  Nicky  do  ?  " 

"  He  does  dangerous  things." 

"  He  forgets." 

"  Nothing  more  dangerous  than  forgetting.  Wc  must 
punish  him  to  make  him  remember." 

"  But  it  doesn't  make  him  remember.  It  only  makes 
him  think  us  fools." 

"  You  know  what  it  means  ?  "  said  Anthony.  "  We 
shall  have  to  send  him  to  school." 

"  Not  yet,"  said  Frances. 

School  was  the  thing  in  the  future  that  she  dreaded. 
Nicky  was  only  nine,  and  they  were  all  getting  on  well 
with  Mr.  Parsons.  Anthony  knew  that  to  send  Nicky 
to  school  now  would  be  punishing  Frances,  not  Nicky. 
The  little  fiend  would  only  grin  in  their  faces  if  they  told 
him  he  was  going  to  school. 

It  was  no  use  trying  to  make  impressions  on  Nicky.  He 
was  as  hard  as  nails.     He  would  never  feel  things. 

Perhaps,  Frances  thought,  it  was  just  as  well. 


"  I  do  think  it  was  nice  of  Jane,"  said  Nicky,  "  to 
have  Jerry." 

"  And  I  do  think  it  was  nice  of  me,"  said  Dorothy,  "  to 
give  him  to  you." 

Jane  was  Dorothy's  cat;  therefore  her  kittens  were 
Dorothy's. 

"  I  wouldn't  have  given  him  to  just  anybody." 

"  I  know,"  said  Nicky. 

"  I  might  have  kept  him.  He's  the  nicest  kitten  Jane 
ever  had." 

"  I  know,"  said  Nicky.     "  It  was  nice  of  you." 

"  I  might  want  him  back  again." 

"I  — know." 

Nicky  was  quiet  and  serious,  almost  humble,  as  if  he 
went  in  the  fear  of  losing  Jerry.  Nobody  but  Jerry  and 
Dorothy  saw  Nicky  in  that  mood. 

Not  that  he  was  really  afraid.  Nothing  could  take 
Jerry  from  him.  If  Dorothy  could  have  taken  him  back 
again  she  wouldn't  have,  not  even  if  she  had  really  wanted 
him.     Dorothy  wasn't  cruel,  and  she  was  only  ragging. 

But  certainly  he  was  Jane's  nicest  kitten.  Jane  was 
half-Persian,  white  with  untidy  tabby  patterns  on  her. 
Jerry  was  black  all  over.  Whatever  attitude  he  took,  his 
tight,  short  fur  kept  the  outlines  of  his  figure  firm  and 
clear,  whether  he  arched  his  back  and  jumped  sideways,  or 
rolled  himself  into  a  cushion,  or  squatted  with  haunches 

49 


5o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

spread  and  paws  doubled  in  under  bis  breast,  or  sat  bolt 
upright  with  his  four  legs  straight  like  pillars,  and  his 
tail  curled  about  his  feet.  Jerry's  coat  shone  like  black 
looking-glass,  and  the  top  of  his  head  smelt  sweet,  like  a 
dove's  breast. 

And  he  had  yellow  eyes.  Mary-Nanna  said  they  would 
turn  green  some  day.  But  Nicky  didn't  believe  it. 
Mary-Nanna  was  only  ragging.  Jerry's  eyes  would  al- 
ways be  yellow. 

Mr.  Parsons  declared  that  Nicky  sat  for  whole  hours 
meditating  on  Jerry,  as  if  in  this  way  he  could  make  him 
last  longer. 

Jerry's  life  was  wonderful  to  Nicky.  Once  he  was 
so  small  that  his  body  covered  hardly  the  palm  of  your 
hand ;  you  could  see  his  skin ;  it  felt  soft  and  weak  through 
the  thin  fur,  sleeked  flat  and  wet  where  Jane  had  licked 
it.  His  eyes  were  buttoned  up  tight.  Then  they  opened. 
He  crawled  feebly  on  the  floor  after  Jane,  or  hung  on  to 
her  little  breasts,  pressing  out  the  milk  with  his  clever 
paws.  Then  Jerry  got  older.  Sometimes  he  went  mad 
and  became  a  bat  or  a  bird,  and  flew  up  the  drawing-room 
curtains  as  if  his  legs  were  wings. 

Nicky  said  that  Jerry  could  turn  himself  into  anything 
he  pleased;  a  hawk,  an  owl,  a  dove,  a  Himalayan  bear,  a 
snake,  a  flying  squirrel,  a  monkey,  a  rabbit,  a  panther,  and 
a  little  black  lamb  of  God. 

Jerry  was  a  cat  now ;  he  was  two  years  old. 

Jerry's  fixed  idea  seemed  to  be  that  he  was  a  very 
young  cat,  and  that  he  must  be  nursed  continually,  and 
that  nobody  but  Nicky  must  nurse  him.  Mr.  Parsons 
found  that  Nicky  made  surprising  progress  in  his  Latin 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  51 

and  Greek  that  year.  What  had  baffled  Mr.  Parsons  up 
till  now  had  been  Nicky's  incapacity  for  sitting  still.  But 
he  would  sit  still  enough  when  Jerry  was  on  his  knee, 
pressed  tight  between  the  edge  of  the  desk  and  Nicky's 
stomach,  so  that  knowledge  entered  into  Nicky  through 
Jerry  when  there  was  no  other  way. 

Nicky  would  even  sit  still  in  the  open  air  to  watch 
Jerry  as  he  stalked  bees  in  the  grass,  or  played  by  him- 
self, over  and  over  again,  his  own  enchanted  game.  He 
always  played  it  in  the  same  way.  He  started  from  the 
same  clump  in  the  border,  to  run  in  one  long  careening 
curve  across  the  grass;  at  the  same  spot  in  the  lawn 
he  bounded  sideways  and  gave  the  same  little  barking  grunt 
and  dashed  oif  into  the  bushes.  When  you  tried  to  catch 
him  midway  he  stood  on  his  hind  legs  and  bowed  to 
you  slantwise,  waving  his  forepaws,  or  rushed  like  light- 
ning up  the  tree  of  Heaven,  and  climbed  into  the  highest 
branches  and  clung  there,  looking  down  at  you.  His  yel- 
low eyes  shone  through  the  green  leaves ;  they  quivered ; 
they  played ;  they  mocked  you  with  some  challenge,  some 
charm,  secret  and  divine  and  savage. 

"  The  soul  of  Nicky  is  in  that  cat,"  Frances  said. 

Jerry  knew  that  he  was  Nicky's  cat.  When  other  people 
caught  him  he  scrabbled  over  their  shoulders  with  his 
claws  and  got  away  from  them.  When  Nicky  caught  him 
he  lay  quiet  and  heavy  in  his  arms,  pressing  down  and 
spreading  his  soft  body.  Nicky's  sense  of  touch  had  been 
hardened  by  violent  impacts  and  collisions,  by  experiments 
with  jack-knives  and  saws  and  chisels  and  gouges,  and  by 
struggling  with  the  material  of  his  everlasting  inventions. 
Through  communion  with   Jerry  it  became  tender  and 


52  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

sensitive  again.  It  delighted  in  the  cat's  throbbing  purr 
and  the  thrill  of  his  feet,  as  Jerry,  serious  and  earnest, 
padded  down  his  bed  on  Nicky's  knee. 

"  I  like  him  best,  though,"  said  Nicky,  "  when  he's 
sleepy  and  at  the  same  time  bitesome." 

"You  mustn't  let  him  bite  you,"  Frances  said. 

"  I  don't  mind,"  said  Nicky.  "  He  wouldn't  do  it  if 
he  didn't  like  me." 

Jerry  had  dropped  off  to  sleep  with  his  jaws  closing 
drowsily  on  Nicky's  arm.  When  it  moved  his  hind  legs 
kicked  at  it  and  tore. 

"  He's  dreaming  when  he  does  that,"  said  Nicky.  "  He 
thinks  he's  a  panther  and  I'm  buffaloes." 

Mr.  Parsons  laughed  at  him.  "  Nicky  and  his  cat !  " 
he  said.  Nicky  didn't  care.  Mr.  Parsons  was  always 
ragging  him. 

The  tutor  preferred  dogs  himself.  He  couldn't  afford 
any  of  the  expensive  breeds;  but  that  summer  he  was 
taking  care  of  a  Russian  wolfhound  for  a  friend  of  his. 
When  Mr.  Parsons  ran  with  Michael  and  Nicky  round 
the  Heath,  the  great  borzoi  ran  before  them  with  long 
leaps,  head  downwards,  setting  an  impossible  pace. 
Michael  and  Dorothy  adored  Boris  openly.  Nicky,  out 
of  loyalty  to  Jerry,  stifled  a  secret  admiration.  For  Mr. 
Parsons  held  that  a  devotion  to  a  cat  was  incompatible 
with  a  proper  feeling  for  a  dog,  whence  Nicky  had  in- 
ferred that  any  feeling  for  a  dog  must  do  violence  to  the 
nobler  passion. 

Mr.  Parsons  tried  to  wean  Nicky  from  what  he  pre- 
tended  to  regard  as  his  unmanly  weakness.  "Wait, 
Nicky,"  he  said,  "  till  you've  got  a  dog  of  your  own." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  53 

"  I  don't  want  a  dog  of  my  own,"  said  Nicky.  "  I 
don't  want  anything  but  Jerry."  Boris,  he  said,  was  not 
clever,  like  Jerry.     He  had  a  silly  face. 

"Think  so?"  said  Mr.  Parsons.  "Look  at  his  jaws. 
They  could  break  Jerry's  back  with  one  snap." 

"  Could  he,  Daddy  ?  " 

They  were  at  tea  on  the  lawn,  and  Boris  had  gone  to 
sleep  under  Mr.  Parsons'  legs  with  his  long  muzzle  on 
his  forepaws. 

"  He  could,"  said  Anthony,  "  if  he  caught  him." 

"  But  he  couldn't  catch  him.  Jerry'd  be  up  a  tree  be- 
fore Boris  could  look  at  him." 

"  If  you  want  Jerry  to  shin  up  trees  you  must  keep  his 
weight  down." 

Nicky  laughed.  He  knew  that  Boris  could  never  catch 
Jerry.     His  father  was  only  ragging  him. 


Nicky  was  in  the  schoolroom,  bowed  over  his  desk.  He 
was  doing  an  imposition,  the  second  aorist  of  the  abomin- 
able verb  epxo[iai,  written  out  five  and  twenty  times. 
(Luckily  he  could  do  the  last  fifteen  times  from  memory.) 

Nicky  had  been  arguing  with  Mr.  Parsons.  Mr.  Par- 
sons had  said  that  the  second  aorist  of  epxofmi  was  not  VPX0V- 

Nicky  had  said,  "  I  can't  help  it.  If  it's  not  rjpxov 
it  ought  to  be." 

Mr.  Parsons  had  replied :  "  The  verb  epx°^at  is 
irregular."  And  Nicky  had  retorted,  in  effect,  that  no 
verb  had  any  business  to  be  as  irregular  as  all  that.  Mr. 
Parsons  had  then  suggested  that  Nicky  might  know  more 
about  the  business  of  irregular  verbs  if  he  wrote  out  the 


54  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

second  aorist  of   fyx0/10"   five  and  twenty  times  after  tea. 

As  it  was  a  particularly  fine  afternoon,  an  imposition 
was,  Nicky  admitted,  a  score  for  Mr.  Parsons  and  a 
jolly  good  sell  for  him. 

Mr.  Parsons  had  not  allowed  him  to  have  Jerry  on  his 
knee,  or  even  in  the  room ;  and  this,  Nicky  owned  further, 
was  but  just.  It  wouldn't  have  been  nearly  so  good  a 
punishment  if  he  had  had  Jerry  with  him. 

Nicky,  bowed  over  his  desk,  struggled  for  the  perfect 
legibility  which  Mr.  Parsons  had  insisted  on,  as  otherwise 
the  imposition  would  do  him  more  harm  than  good.  He 
was  in  for  it,  and  the  thing  must  be  done  honourably 
if  it  was  done  at  all.  He  had  only  looked  out  of  the 
windows  twice  to  make  sure  that  Boris  was  asleep  under 
Mr.  Parsons'  legs.  And  once  he  had  left  the  room  to 
see  where  Jerry  was.  He  had  found  him  in  the  kitchen 
garden,  sitting  on  a  bed  of  fresh-grown  mustard  and  cress, 
ruining  it.  He  sat  like  a  lamb,  his  forepaws  crossed, 
his  head  tilted  slightly  backwards.  His  yellow  eyes 
gazed  at  Nicky  with  a  sweet  and  mournful  innocence. 

Nicky  did  not  hear  the  voices  in  the  garden. 

"  I'm  awfully  sorry,  sir,"  Mr.  Parsons  was  saying.  "  I 
can't  think  how  it  could  have  happened."  Mr.  Parsons' 
voice  was  thick  and  his  face  was  very  red.  "  I  could 
have  sworn  the  door  was  shut." 

"  Johnnie  opened  it,"  said  Anthony.  He  seemed  to 
have  caught,  suddenly,  one  of  his  bad  colds  and  to  be 
giving  it  to  Mr.  Parsons.  They  were  both  in  their  shirt- 
sleeves, and  Anthony  carried  something  in  his  arms  which 
he  had  covered  with  his  coat. 

The  borzoi  stood  in  front  of  them.     His  face  had  a 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  55 

look  of  foolish  ecstasy.  He  stared  at  Mr.  Parsons,  and 
as  he  stared  he  panted.  There  was  a  red  smear  on  his 
white  breast;  his  open  jaws  still  dripped  a  pink  slaver. 
It  sprayed  the  ground  in  front  of  them,  jerked  out  with 
his  panting. 

"  Get  away,  you  damned  brute,"  said  Mr.  Parsons. 

Boris  abashed  himself;  he  stretched  out  his  fore  legs 
towards  Mr.  Parsons,  shook  his  raised  haunches,  lifted  up 
his  great  saw-like  muzzle,  and  rolled  into  one  monstrous 
cry  a  bark,  a  howl,  a  yawn. 

Nicky  heard  it,  and  he  looked  out  of  the  schoolroom 
window.  He  saw  the  red  smear  on  the  white  curly  breast, 
lie  saw  his  father  in  his  shirt  sleeves,  carrying  something 
in  his  arms  that  he  had  covered  with  his  coat. 

Under  the  tree  of  Heaven  Dorothy  and  Michael,  crouch- 
ing close  against  their  mother,  cried  quietly.  Frances 
was  crying,  too;  for  it  was  she  who  would  have  to  tell 
Nicky. 

Dorothy  tried  to  console  him. 

"  Jerry's  eyes  would  have  turned  green,  if  he  had 
lived,  Nicky.     They  would,  really." 

"  I  wouldn't  have  minded.  They'd  have  been  Jerry's 
eyes." 

"  But  he  wouldn't  have  looked  like  Jerry." 

"  I  wouldn't  have  cared  what  he  looked  like.  He'd 
have  been  Jerry." 

"  I'll  give  you  Jane,  Nicky,  and  all  the  kittens  she  ever 
has,  if  that  would  make  up." 

"  It  wouldn't.  You  don't  seem  to  understand  that  it's 
Jerry  I  want.     I  wish  you  wouldn't  talk  about  him." 

"  Very  well,"  said  Dorothy,  "  I  won't." 


56  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Then  Grannie  tried.  She  recommended  a  holy  resigna- 
tion. God,  she  said,  had  given  Jerry  to  Nicky,  and  God 
had  taken  him  away. 

"  He  didn't  give  him  me,  and  he'd  no  right  to  take 
him.  Dorothy  wouldn't  have  done  it.  She  was  only 
ragging.  But  when  God  does  things,"  said  Nicky  sav- 
agely, "  it  isn't  a  rag." 

He  hated  Grannie,  and  he  hated  Mr.  Parsons,  and  he 
hated  God.  But  he  loved  Dorothy  who  had  given  him 
Jerry. 

Night  after  night  Frances  held  him  in  her  arms  at 
bed-time  while  Nicky  said  the  same  thing.  "  If  —  if  I 
could  stop  seeing  him.  But  I  keep  on  seeing  him.  When 
he  sat  on  the  mustard  and  cress.  And  when  he  bit  me  with 
his  sleep-bites.  And  when  he  looked  at  me  out  of  the 
tree  of  Heaven.  Then  I  hear  that  little  barking  grunt 
he  used  to  make  when  he  was  playing  with  himself  — 
when  he  dashed  off  into  the  bushes. 

"  And  I  can't  bear  it." 

Night  after  night  Nicky  cried  himself  to  sleep. 

For  the  awful  thing  was  that  it  had  been  all  his  fault. 
If  he  had  kept  Jerry's  weight  down  Boris  couldn't  have 
caught  him. 

"  Daddy  said  so,  Mummy." 

Over  and  over  again  Frances  said,  "  It  wasn't  your 
fault.  It  was  Don-Don's.  He  left  the  door  open. 
Surely  you  can  forgive  Don-Don  ?  "  Over  and  over  again 
Nicky  said,  "  I  do  forgive  him." 

But  it  was  no  good.  Nicky  became  first  supernatural ly 
subdued  and  gentle,  then  ill.  They  had  to  take  him  away 
from  home,  away  from  the  sight  of  the  garden,  and  away 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  57 

from  Mr.  Parsons,  forestalling  the  midsummer  holidays  by 
two  months. 

Nicky  at  the  seaside  was  troublesome  and  happy,  and 
they  thought  he  had  forgotten.  But  on  the  first  evening 
at  Hampstead,  as  Frances  kissed  him  Good-night,  he  said : 
"  Shall  I  have  to  see  Mr.  Parsons  to-morrow  ? " 

Frances  said :     "  Yes.     Of  course." 

"  I'd  rather  not." 

"  Nonsense,  you  must  get  over  that." 

"I  —  can't,  Mummy." 

"  Oh,  Nicky,  can't  you  forgive  poor  Mr.  Parsons  ? 
When  he  was  so  unhappy  ?  " 

Nicky  meditated. 

"  Do  you  think,"  he  said  at  last,  "  he  really  minded  ?  " 

"  I'm  sure  he  did." 

"  As  much  as  you  and  Daddy  ?  " 

"  Quite  as  much." 

"  Then,"  said  Nicky,  "  I'll  forgive  him." 

But,  though  he  forgave  John  and  Mr.  Parsons  and  even 
God,  who,  to  do  him  justice,  did  not  seem  to  have  been  able 
to  help  it,  Nicky  did  not  forgive  himself. 

Yet  Frances  never  could  think  why  the  sight  of  mustard 
and  cress  made  Nicky  sick.  Neither  did  Mr.  Parsons, 
nor  any  schoolmaster  who  came  after  him  understand  why, 
when  Nicky  knew  all  the  rest  of  the  verb  cpx°/*at  by 
heart  he  was  unable  to  remember  the  second  aorist. 

He  had  an  excellent  memory,  but  there  was  always  a 
gap  in  it  just  there. 


VI 

In  that  peace  and  tranquillity  where  nothing  ever  hap- 
pened, Jerry's  violent  death  would  have  counted  as 
an  event,  a  date  to  reckon  by;  but  for  three  memorable 
things  that  happened,  one  after  another,  in  the  summer 
and  autumn  of  'ninety -nine :  the  return  of  Frances's 
brother,  Maurice  Fleming,  from  Australia  where  An- 
thony had  sent  him  two  years  ago,  on  the  express  under- 
standing that  he  was  to  stay  there;  the  simultaneous  ar- 
rival of  Anthony's  brother,  Bartholomew,  and  his  family; 
and  the  outbreak  of  the  Boer  War. 

The  return  of  Morrie  was  not  altogether  unforeseen,  and 
Bartholomew  had  announced  his  coming  well  beforehand, 
but  who  could  have  dreamed  that  at  the  end  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  England  would  be  engaged  in  a  War  that 
really  was  a  War  ?  Frances,  with  the  Times  in  her  hands, 
supposed  that  that  meant  more  meddling  and  muddling  of 
stupid  politicians,  and  that  it  would  mean  more  silly 
speeches  in  Parliament,  and  copy,  at  last,  for  foolish  vio- 
lent, pathetic  and  desperate  editors,  and  breach  of  promise 
cases,  divorces  and  fires  in  paraffin  shops  reduced  to  mo- 
mentary insignificance. 

But  as  yet  there  was  no  war,  nor  any  appearance  that 
sensible  people  interpreted  as  a  sign  of  war  at  the  time  of 
Morrie's  return.  It  stood  alone,  as  other  past  returns,  the 
return  from  Bombay,  the  return  from  Canada,  the  return 
from  Cape  Colony,  had  stood,  in  its  sheer  awfulness.  To 
Frances  it  represented  the  extremity  of  disaster. 

58 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  59 

They  might  have  known  what  was  coming  by  Grannie's 
behaviour.  One  day,  the  day  when  the  Australian  mail 
arrived,  she  had  subsided  suddenly  into  a  state  of  softness 
and  gentleness.  She  approached  her  son-in-law  with  an 
air  of  sorrowful  deprecation ;  she  showed  a  certain  defer- 
ence to  her  daughter  Louie ;  she  was  soft  and  gentle  even 
with  Emmeline  and  Edith. 

Mrs.  Fleming  broke  the  news  to  Louie  who  broke  it  to 
Frances  who  in  her  turn  broke  it  to  Anthony.  That  was 
the  procedure  they  invariably  adopted. 

"  I  wonder,"  Grannie  said,  "  wThat  he  can  be  coming 
back  for !  "  Each  time  she  affected  astonishment  and  in- 
credulity, as  if  Morrie's  coming  back  were,  not  a  recur- 
rence that  crushed  you  with  its  flatness  and  staleness,  but 
a  thing  that  must  interest  Louie  because  of  its  utter  un- 
likeliness. 

"  I  wonder,"  said  Louie,  "  why  he  hasn't  come  before. 
What  else  did  you  expect  ?  " 

"  I'm  sure  I  don't  know,"  said  Grannie  helplessly. 
"  Go  and  tell  Frances." 

Louie  went.  And  because  she  knew  that  the  burden 
of  Morrie  would  fall  again  on  Frances's  husband  she  was 
disagreeable  with  Frances. 

"  It's  all  very  well  for  you,"  she  said.  "  You  haven't 
got  to  live  with  him.  You  haven't  got  to  sleep  in  the 
room  next  him.     You  don't  know  what  it's  like." 

"  I  do  know,"  said  Frances.  "  I  remember.  You'll 
have  to  bear  it." 

"  You  haven't  had  to  bear  it  for  fourteen  years." 

"  You'll  have  to  bear  it,"  Frances  repeated,  "  till  An- 
thony sends  him  out  again.     That's  all  it  amounts  to." 


60  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

She  waited  till  the  children  were  in  bed  and  she  was 
alone  with  Anthony. 

"  Something  awful's  happened,"  she  said,  and  paused 
hoping  he  would  guess. 

"  I  don't  know  how  to  tell  you." 

"  Don't  tell  me  if  it's  that  Nicky's  been  taking  my 
new  bike  to  pieces." 

"  It  isn't  Nicky  —     It's  Maurice." 

Anthony  got  up  and  cleared  his  pipe,  thoroughly  and 
deliberately.     She  wondered  whether  he  had  heard. 

"  I'd  no  business  to  have  married  you  —  to  have  let  you 
in  for  him." 

"  Why  ?     What's  he  been  up  to  now  ?  " 

"  He's  coming  home." 

"  So,"  said  Anthony,  "  is  Bartholomew.  I'd  no  busi- 
ness to  have  let  you  in  for  him. 

"  Don't  worry,  Frances.  If  Morrie  comes  home  he'll 
be  sent  out  again,  that's  all." 

"  At  your  expense." 

"  I  don't  grudge  any  expense  in  sending  Morrie  out. 
Nor  in  keeping  him  out." 

"  Yes.     But  this  time  it's  different.     It's  worse." 

"  Why  worse  ?  " 

"  Because  of  the  children.  They're  older  now  than 
they  were  last  time.     They'll  understand." 

"  What  if  they  do  ?  They  must  learn,"  Anthony  said, 
"  to  realize  facts." 

They  realized  them  rather  sooner  than  he  had  expected. 
Nobody  but  Louie  had  allowed  for  the  possibility  of  Mor- 
rie's  sailing  by  the  same  steamer  as  his  letter;  and  Louie 
had  argued  that,  if  he  had  done  so,  he  was  bound  either 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  61 

to  have  arrived  before  the  letter  or  to  have  sent  a  wire. 
Therefore  they  had  at  least  a  clear  five  days  of  peace  be- 
fore them.  Anthony  thought  he  had  shown  wisdom  when, 
the  next  morning  which  was  a  Wednesday,  he  sent  Grannie 
and  the  Aunties  to  Eastbourne  for  a  week,  so  that  they 
shouldn't  worry  Frances,  and  when  on  Thursday  he  made 
her  go  with  him  for  a  long  day  in  the  country,  to  take  her 
mind  off  Morrie. 

They  came  back  at  nine  in  the  evening  and  found  Doro- 
thy, Michael  and  Nicholas  sitting  up  for  them.  Michael 
and  Nicky  were  excited,  but  Dorothy  looked  grown-up  and 
important. 

"  Uncle  Morrie's  come,"  they  said. 

"  Dorothy  saw  him  first  — " 

"  Nicky  let  him  in  — " 

"  He  hadn't  got  a  hat  on." 

"  We  kept  him  in  the  schoolroom  till  Nanna  could  come 
and  put  him  to  bed." 

"  He  was  crying  because  he'd  been  to  Grannie's  house 
and  there  wasn't  anybody  there  — " 

"  And  because  he'd  lost  the  love-birds  he'd  brought  for 
Auntie  Emmy  — " 

"  And  because  he  couldn't  remember  which  of  us  was 
dead." 

"  No,  Mummy,  nobody's  seen  him  but  us  and  Nanna." 

"  Nanna's  with  him  now." 

Uncle  Morrie  never  accounted,  even  to  himself,  for  the 
time  he  had  spent  between  the  arrival  of  his  ship  at 
Tilbury  on  Sunday  morning  and  that  Saturday  afternoon. 
Neither  could  he  remember  what  had  become  of  his  lug- 
gage or  whether  he  had  ever  had  any.     Only  the  County 


62  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Council  man,  going  his  last  rounds  in  the  farthest  places 
of  the  Heath,  came  upon  a  small  bundle  tied  in  a  blue 
handkerchief,  a  cap  belonging  to  E.  D.  Boulger,  of  the 
S.S.  Arizona,  a  cage  of  love-birds,  and  a  distinct  impres- 
sion of  a  recumbent  human  form,  on  the  grass  together, 
under  a  young  birch  tree. 


In  the  stuffy  little  house  behind  the  Judge's  Walk  the 
four  women  lived  now  under  male  protection.  When  they 
crossed  the  Heath  they  had  no  longer  any  need  to  borrow 
Anthony  from  Frances ;  they  had  a  man  of  their  own.  To 
make  room  for  him  Auntie  Louie  and  her  type-writer  were 
turned  out  of  their  own  place,  and  Auntie  Louie  had  to 
sleep  in  Grannie's  bed,  a  thing  she  hated.  To  make  room 
for  the  type-writer  the  grey  parrot  was  turned  out  of  the 
dining-room  into  the  drawing-room.  And  as  Maurice 
couldn't  stand  either  the  noise  of  the  type-writer  or  the 
noises  of  the  parrot  he  found  both  the  dining-room  and 
the  drawing-room  uninhabitable. 

Day  after  day  Dorothy  and  Michael  and  Nicky,  on  the 
terrace,  looked  out  for  his  coming.  (Only  extreme  dis- 
tance made  Uncle  Morrie's  figure  small  and  harmless  and 
pathetic.)  Day  after  day  he  presented  himself  with  an 
air  of  distinction  and  assurance,  flushed,  and  a  little  bat- 
tered, but  still  handsome,  wearing  a  spruce  grey  suit  and 
a  panama  hat  bought  with  Anthony's  money.  Sheep- 
farming  in  Australia  —  he  had  infinitely  preferred  the 
Cape  Mounted  Police  —  had  ruined  Maurice's  nerves. 
He  was  good  for  nothing  but  to  lounge  in  Anthony's 
garden,  to  ride  his  horses  —  it  was  his  riding  that  had  got 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  63 

him  into  the  Cape  Mounted  Police  —  to  sit  at  his  table 
and  drink  his  wines,  and,  when  there  was  no  more  wine 
for  him,  to  turn  into  Jack  Straw's  Castle  for  a  pick-me-up 
on  his  way  home. 

And  before  July  was  out  three  others  were  added  to 
the  garden  group :  Bartholomew  and  Vera  and  Veronica. 
And  after  them  a  fourth,  Vera's  friend,  Captain  Ferdi- 
nand Cameron,  home  on  sick  leave  before  anybody  ex- 
pected him. 

Frances's  tree  of  Heaven  sheltered  them  all. 


VII 

Baktholomew,  Anthony's  brother,  lived  in  Bombay  and 
looked  after  his  business  for  him  in  the  East.  He  had 
something  the  matter  with  him,  and  he  had  come  home 
to  look  after  his  own  health.  At  least,  Bartholomew's 
health  was  what  he  was  supposed  to  be  looking  after ;  but 
Dorothy  had  heard  her  father  say  that  Bartie  had  come 
home  to  look  after  Vera. 

Vera  was  Bartie's  wife  and  Veronica's  mother.  Be- 
fore she  became  Mrs.  Bartholomew  Harrison  she  had  been 
Frances's  schoolfellow  and  her  dearest  friend.  Frances 
Fleming  had  been  her  bridesmaid  and  had  met  Anthony  for 
the  first  time  at  Vera's  wedding,  when  he  had  fallen  in 
love  with  her;  and  she  had  fallen  in  love  with  him  when 
they  stayed  together  in  Bartholomew's  house,  before 
Bartholomew  took  Vera  to  Bombay. 

Bartie  had  not  been  married  ten  months  before  he 
wanted  to  get  Vera  out  of  England;  and  Vera  had  not 
been  in  India  for  ten  weeks  before  he  wanted  her  to  go 
back.  They  were  always  coming  backwards  and  forwards, 
but  they  never  came  together.  Vera  would  be  sent  home 
first,  and  then  Bartie  would  come  over  in  a  great  hurry 
and  take  her  out  again. 

Twelve  years  after  their  marriage  Veronica  was  born 
at  Simla,  and  the  coming  and  going  ceased  for  three  years. 
Then  Bartie  sent  them  both  home.  That  time  Vera  had 
refused  to  travel  farther  westward  than  Marseilles.     She 

64 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  65 

was  afraid  of  damp  and  cold,  and  she  had  got  the  ship's 
doctor  to  order  her  to  the  Riviera.  She  and  Veronica 
had  been  living  for  two  years  in  a  small  villa  at  Agaye. 

This  summer  she  had  come  to  England.  She  was  no 
longer  afraid  of  damp  and  cold.     And  Bartie  followed  her. 

Dorothy  and  Michael  had  no  difficulty  in  remembering 
Vera,  though  it  was  more  than  six  years  since  they  had 
seen  her;  for  Vera  looked  the  same.  Her  hair  still 
shone  like  copper-beech  leaves;  her  face  had  still  the 
same  colour  and  the  same  sweet,  powdery  smell.  And 
if  these  things  had  changed  Frances  would  still  have 
known  her  by  her  forehead  that  looked  so  broad  because 
her  eyebrows  and  her  eyes  were  so  long,  and  by  her  fine, 
unfinished,  passionate  mouth,  by  her  pointed  chin  and 
by  her  ways. 

But  though  her  brother-in-law's  ways  had  always  been 
more  or  less  disagreeable,  Frances  was  not  prepared  for 
the  shock  of  the  renewed  encounter  with  Bartholomew. 
Bartie  was  long  and  grey,  and  lean  even  when  you  allowed 
for  the  thickness  of  his  cholera  belt.  He  wore  a  white 
scarf  about  his  throat,  for  his  idea  was  that  he  had  cancer 
in  it.  Cancer  made  you  look  grey.  He,  too,  had  the 
face  of  a  hawk,  of  a  tired  and  irritable  hawk.  It  drooped 
between  his  hunched  shoulders,  his  chin  hanging  above 
the  scarf  as  if  he  were  too  tired  or  too  irritable  to  hold  it 
up.  He  behaved  to  Vera  and  Veronica  as  if  it  was  they 
who  had  worried  him  into  cancer  of  the  throat,  they  who 
tired  and  irritated  him. 

Vera  talked  to  him  as  you  might  talk  to  a  sick  child 
whose  peevishness  prolongs,  unreasonably,  its  pain.  Bar- 
tie's  manner  almost  amounted  to  a  public  repudiation  of 


66  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

her.  The  whole  house  vibrated  to  the  shutting  of  his 
door  at  Good-night  time.  Yet  when  Bartie  came  down  in 
the  morning,  late,  and  more  morose  than  ever,  Vera's 
mouth  made  as  if  it  kissed  some  visionary  image  of  the 
poor  thing's  absurdity.  She  didn't  believe  for  one  min- 
ute in  his  cancer.  It  was  an  excuse  for  the  shutting  of 
his  door. 

She  kept  out  of  his  way  as  much  as  possible ;  yet,  when 
they  were  together  they  watched  each  other.  They 
watched;  Bartie  openly  with  sudden  dartings  and  swoop- 
ings  of  his  hawk's  eyes;  Vera  furtively.  Her  eyes  were 
so  large  and  long  that,  without  turning  her  head,  or  any 
visible  movement,  they  could  hold  his  image. 

But  for  Captain  Cameron  Vera's  eyes  had  a  full,  open 
gaze.  Spread  wide  apart  under  her  wide  forehead  they 
were  like  dark  moth's  wings ;  they  hovered,  rested,  flicker- 
ing, vibrating  to  the  fine  tips  of  their  corners. 

Whatever  had  been  the  matter  with  him  in  India,  Cap- 
tain Cameron  had  recovered.  His  keen,  fair,  Highland 
face  made  Bartie's  face  look  terrible.  Ferdie  was  charm- 
ing; not  more  charming  to  Bartie's  wife  than  he  was  to 
Frances ;  not  more  charming  to  Frances  than  to  her  sisters ; 
so  that  even  Louie  unbent,  and  Emmeline  and  Edith  fell 
in  love  with  him.  He  flirted  with  Frances  under  An- 
thony's nose ;  and  with  the  Aunties  under  Grannie's  nose. 
The  corners  of  Vera's  mouth  followed  the  tilt  of  her 
long  eyes'  corners  as  she  saw  him  do  it. 

You  could  not  think  of  Vera  as  the  children's  Auntie, 
or  as  Bartie's  wife,  or  as  Veronica's  mother. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  67 

Veronica  was  a  very  little  girl  who  sang  songs  and  was 
afraid  of  ghosts. 

She  slept  in  her  mother's  room,  and  so  never  could  be 
put  to  bed  till  half-past  seven,  or  till  her  mother  was 
dressed  to  the  last  hook  of  her  gown,  the  last  hairpin,  the 
last  touch  of  powder  (adhesive  without  bismuth),  and  the 
last  shadow  drawn  fine  about  her  eyelashes.  When  Vera, 
beautiful  in  a  beautiful  gown,  came  trailing  into  the 
room  where  everybody  waited  for  her,  Veronica  hid  her- 
self behind  Uncle  Anthony's  big  chair.  When  her  father 
told  her  to  come  out  of  that  and  say  good-night  and  be 
quick  about  it,  she  came  slowly  (she  was  not  in  the  least 
afraid  of  Bartie),  showing  herself  bit  by  bit,  honey- 
coloured  hair,  eyebrows  dark  under  her  gold,  very  dark 
against  her  white;  sorrowful,  transparent,  lucid  eyes.  A 
little  girl  with  a  straight  white  face.  A  little,  slender  girl 
in  a  straight  white  frock.  She  stood  by  Anthony's  chair, 
spinning  out  the  time,  smiling  at  him  with  her  childish 
wavering  mouth,  a  smile  that  would  not  spread,  that 
never  went  higher  than  the  tip  of  her  white  nose,  that  left 
her  lucid,  transparent  eyes  still  sorrowful. 

She  knew  that  Anthony  would  take  her  on  his  knee,  and 
that  she  could  sit  there  with  her  head  tucked  under  his 
chin,  smiling  at  him,  prolonging  her  caresses,  till  Vera 
told  him  to  put  her  down  and  let  her  go. 

Bartie  growled :  "Did  you  hear  your  mother  telling 
you  to  say  Good-night  ?  " 

"  Yes.  But  I  must  kiss  Uncle  Anthony  first.  Prop- 
erly. Once  on  his  mouth.  Once  —  on  his  nose.  And 
once  —  on  —  his  —  eyes.  And  —  once  —  on  —  his  — 
dear  little  —  ears." 


68  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

After  that,  Veronica  went  slowly  from  chair  to  chair, 
lingering  at  each,  sitting  first  on  Frances's  lap,  then  on 
Vera's,  spinning  out  her  caresses,  that  spun  out  the  time 
and  stretched  it  farther  and  farther  between  her  and  the 
unearthly  hour  ahead  of  her. 

But  at  her  father's  chair  she  did  not  linger  for  a  single 
instant.  She  slipped  her  hand  into  his  hand  that  dropped 
it  as  if  it  had  hurt  him;  she  touched  his  forehead  with 
her  small  mouth,  pushed  out,  absurdly,  to  keep  her  face 
as  far  as  possible  from  his.  For,  though  she  was  not 
afraid  of  Bartie,  he  was  not  nice  either  to  sit  on  or  to 
kiss. 

Half-way  across  the  room  she  lingered. 

"  I  haven't  sung  '  London  Bridge  is  broken  down.' 
Don't  you  want  me  to  sing  it  ?  " 

"  No,  darling.     We  want  you  to  go  to  bed." 

"  I'm  going,  Mummy." 

And  at  the  door  she  turned  and  looked  at  them  with 
her  sorrowful,  lucid,  transparent  eyes. 

Then  she  went,  leaving  the  door  open  behind  her.  She 
left  it  open  on  purpose,  so  that  she  might  hear  their 
voices,  and  look  down  into  the  room  on  her  way  upstairs. 
Besides,  she  always  hoped  that  somebody  would  call  her 
back  again. 

She  lingered  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs  till  Bartie  got  up 
and  shut  the  door  on  her.  She  lingered  at  the  turn  of 
the  stairs  and  on  the  landing.  But  nobody  ever  called 
her  back  again. 

And  nobody  but  Nicky  knew  what  she  was  afraid  of. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  69 

Veronica  was  sitting  up  in  the  cot  that  used  to  be 
Nicky's  when  he  was  little.  Nicky,  rather  cold  in  his 
pyjamas,  sat  on  the  edge  of  it  beside  her.  A  big,  yellow, 
tremendous  moon  hung  in  the  sky  outside  the  window,  be- 
hind a  branch  of  the  tree  of  Heaven,  and  looked  at  them. 

Veronica  crouched  sideways  on  her  pillow  in  a  corner 
of  the  cot,  her  legs  doubled  up  tight  under  her  tiny  body, 
her  shoulders  hunched  together,  and  her  thin  arms  hang- 
ing before  her  straight  to  her  lap.  Her  honey  coloured 
hair  was  parted  and  gathered  into  two  funny  plaits,  that 
stuck  out  behind  her  ear.  Her  head  was  tilted  slightly 
backwards  to  rest  against  the  rail  of  the  cot.  She  looked 
at  Nicky  and  her  look  reminded  him  of  something,  he 
couldn't  remember  what. 

"  Were  you  ever  afraid,  Nicky  ?  "  she  said. 

Nicky  searched  his  memory  for  some  image  encircled 
by  an  atmosphere  of  terror,  and  found  there  a  white  hound 
with  red  smears  on  his  breast  and  a  muzzle  like  two  saws. 

"  Yes,"  he  said,  "  I  was  once." 

A  lamb  —  a  white  lamb  —  was  what  Veronica  looked 
like.  And  Jerry  had  looked  at  him  like  that  when  he 
found  him  sitting  on  the  mustard  and  cress  the  day  Boris 
killed  him. 

"Afraid  — what  of?" 

"  I  don't  know  that  it  was  '  of '  exactly." 

"  Would  you  be  afraid  of  a  ghost,  now,  if  you  saw  one  ?  " 

"  I  expect  I  jolly  well  should,  if  I  really  saw  one." 

"  Being  afraid  of  ghosts  doesn't  count,  does  it  ?  " 

"  No,  of  course  it  doesn't.  You  aren't  afraid  as  long  as 
I'm  here,  are  you  \  " 

"  No." 


7o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  I  shall  stay,  then,  till  you  go  to  sleep." 

Night  after  night  he  heard  her  calling  to  him,  "  Nicky, 
I'm  frightened."  Nobody  but  Veronica  and  Nicky  were 
ever  in  bed  on  that  floor  before  midnight.  Night  after 
night  he  got  up  and  came  to  her  and  stayed  beside  her  till 
she  went  to  sleep. 

Once  he  said,  "  If  it  was  Michael  he  could  tell  you 
stories." 

"  I  don't  want  Michael.     I  want  you." 

In  the  day-time  she  went  about  looking  for  him. 
"  Where's  Nicky  ?  "  she  said.     "  I  want  him." 

"  Nicky's  in  the  schoolroom.     You  can't  have  him." 

"But  —  I  want  him." 

"  Can't  be  helped.     You  must  do  without  him." 

"  Will  he  be  very  long  ?  " 

"  Yes,  ever  so  long.  Run  away  like  a  good  little  girl 
and  play  with  Don-Don." 

She  knew  that  they  told  her  to  play  with  Don-Don, 
because  she  was  a  little  girl.  If  only  she  could  grow  big- 
quick  and  be  the  same  age  as  Nicky. 

Instead  of  running  away  and  playing  with  Don-Don, 
Ronny  went  away  by  herself  into  the  apple-tree  house, 
to  wait  for  Nicky. 

The  apple-tree  house  stood  on  the  grass-plot  at  the  far 
end  of  the  kitchen  garden.  The  apple-tree  had  had  no 
apples  on  it  for  years.  It  was  so  old  that  it  leaned  over 
at  a  slant;  it  stretched  out  two  great  boughs  like  twisted 
arms,  and  was  propped  up  by  a  wooden  post  under  each 
armpit.  The  breast  of  its  trunk  rested  on  a  cross-beam. 
The  posts  and  the  cross-beam  were  the  doorway  of  the 
house,  and  the  branches  were  its  roof  and  walls.     Anthony 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  71 

had  given  it  to  Veronica  to  live  in,  and  Veronica  had 
given  it  to  Nicky.  It  was  Nicky's  and  Ronny's  house. 
The  others  were  only  visitors  who  were  not  expected  to 
stay.  There  was  room  enough  for  them  both  to  stand  up 
inside  the  doorway,  to  sit  down  in  the  middle,  and  10  lie 
flat  at  the  far  end. 

"  What  more,"  said  Nicky,  "  do  you  want  ?  " 

He  thought  that  everybody  would  be  sure  to  laugh  at 
him  when  he  played  with  Ronny  in  the  apple-tree  house. 

"  I  don't  care  a  ram  if  they  do,"  he  said.  But  no- 
body ever  did,  not  even  Mr.  Parsons. 

Only  Frances,  when  she  passed  by  that  way  and  saw 
Nicky  and  Ronny  sitting  cramped  and  close  under  their 
roof-tree,  smiled  unwillingly.  But  her  smile  had  in  it 
no  sort  of  mockery  at  all.     Nicky  wondered  why. 


"  Is  it,"  said  Dorothy  one  morning,  "  that  Ronny 
doesn't  look  as  if  she  was  Uncle  Bartie's  daughter,  or  that 
Uncle  Bartie  looks  as  if  he  wasn't  Ronny's  father  ?  " 

However  suddenly  and  wantonly  an  idea  struck  Doro- 
thy, she  brought  it  out  as  if  it  had  been  the  result  of  long 
and  mature  consideration. 

"  Or  is  it,"  said  Vera,  "  that  I  don't  look  as  if  I  were 
Ronny's  mother  ?  " 

Her  eyes  had  opened  all  their  length  to  take  in  Doro- 
thy. 

"  No.     I  think  it  is  that  Uncle  Bartie  looks  — " 

Frances  rushed  in.  "  It  doesn't  matter,  my  dear,  what 
you  think." 

"  It  will  some  day,"  said  Dorothy. 


72  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

It  was  perhaps  the  best  thing  she  could  have  said,  as 
showing  that  she  was  more  interested  in  the  effect  she 
would  produce  some  day  than  in  the  sensation  she  had 
created  there  and  then. 

"  May  I  go  round  to  Rosalind's  after  lessons  ?  " 

"  You  may." 

"  And  may  I  stay  to  lunch  if  they  ask  me  ?  " 

"  You  may  stay  as  long  as  they  care  to  have  you. 
Stay  to  tea,  stay  to  dinner,  if  you  like." 

Dorothy  knew  by  the  behaviour  of  her  mother's  face 
that  she  had  scored  somewhere,  somehow.  She  also  knew 
that  she  was  in  disgrace  and  yet  not  in  disgrace;  which, 
if  you  came  to  think  of  it,  was  a  funny  thing. 


About  this  time  Frances  began  to  notice  a  symptom 
in  herself.  She  was  apt  to  resent  it  when  Vera  discussed 
her  children  with  her.  One  late  afternoon  she  and  An- 
thony were  alone  with  Vera.  Captain  Cameron  had  not 
come  round  that  day,  and  Bartie  had  gone  into  town  to 
consult  either  his  solicitor  or  a  specialist.  He  was  always 
consulting  one  or  the  other. 

"  You're  wrong,  you  two,"  said  Vera.  "  You  think 
Michael's  tender  and  Nicky's  hard  and  unimpressionable. 
Michael's  hard.  You  won't  have  to  bother  about  Michael's 
feelings." 

"  Michael's  feelings,"  said  Prances,  "  are  probably  what 
I  shall  have  to  bother  about  more  than  anything." 

"  You  needn't.  For  one  thing,  they'll  be  so  unlike 
your  feelings  that  you  won't  know  whether  they're  feel- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  73 

ings  at  all.  You  won't  even  know  whether  he's  having 
them  or  not.  Nicky's  the  one  you'll  have  to  look  out 
for.     He'll  go  all  the  howlers." 

"  I  don't  think  that  Nicky'll  be  very  susceptible.  He 
hasn't  shown  any  great  signs  so  far." 

"  Hasn't  he !  Nicky's  susceptibility  is  something 
awful." 

"  My  dear  Vera,  you  say  yourself  you  don't  care  about 
children  and  that  you  don't  understand  them." 

"  No  more  I  do,"  said  Vera.  "  But  I  understand 
men." 

"  Do  you  understand  Veronica  ?  " 

"  Of  course  I  don't.  I  said  men.  Veronica's  a  girl. 
Besides,  I'm  Veronica's  mother." 

"  Nicky,"  said  Anthony,  "  is  not  much  more  than 
nine." 

"  You  keep  on  thinking  of  him  as  a  child  —  a  child  — 
nothing  but  a  child.  Wait  till  Nicky  has  children  of  his 
own.     Then  you'll  know." 

"  They  would  be  rather  darlings,  Nicky's  children," 
Frances  said. 

"  So  would  Veronica's." 

"Ver-onica?" 

"  You  needn't  be  frightened.  Nicky's  affection  for 
Ronny  is  purely  paternal." 

"  I'm  not  frightened,"  said  Frances.  But  she  left  the 
room.  She  did  not  care  for  the  turn  the  talk  had  taken. 
Besides,  she  wanted  Vera  to  see  that  she  was  not  afraid 
to  leave  her  alone  with  Anthony. 

"  I'm  glad  Frances  has  gone,"  said  Vera,  "  because  I 


74  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

want  to  talk  to  you.  You'd  never  have  Imown  each  other 
if  it  hadn't  been  for  me.  She  couldn't  have  married  you. 
It  was  I  who  saw  you  both  through." 

He  assented. 

''  And  you  said  if  there  was  ever  anything  you  could 
do  for  me  —     You  haven't  by  any  chance  forgotten  ?  " 

"  I  have  not." 

"  Well,  if  anything  should  happen  to  me  — " 

"  But,  my  dear  girl,  what  should  happen  to  you  ?  " 

"  Things  do  happen,  Anthony." 

"  Yes,  but  how  about  Bartie  ?  " 

"  That's  it.     Supposing  we  separated." 

"  Good  Heavens,  you're  not  contemplating  that,  are 
you?" 

"  I'm  not  contemplating  anything.  But  Bartie  isn't 
very  easy  to  live  with,  is  he  ?  " 

"  ~No,  he's  not.     He  never  was.     All  the  same  — " 

Bartie  was  impossible.  Between  the  diseases  he  had 
and  thought  he  hadn't  and  the  diseases  he  hadn't  and 
thought  he  had,  he  made  life  miserable  for  himself  and 
other  people.  He  was  a  jealous  egoist;  he  had  the  mor- 
bid coldness  of  the  neurotic,  and  Vera  was  passionate. 
She  ought  never  to  have  married  him.     All  the  same  — 

"  All  the  same  I  shall  stick  to  Bartie  as  long  as  it's 
possible.  And  as  long  as  it's  possible  Bartie'll  stick  to  me. 
But,  if  anything  happens  I  want  you  to  promise  that 
you'll  take  Ronny." 

"  You  must  get  Frances  to  promise." 

"  She'll  do  anything  you  ask  her  to,  Anthony." 

When  Frances  came  into  the  room  again  Vera  was  cry- 
ing. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  75 

And  so  Frances  promised. 

" '  London  Bridge  is  broken  down 
{Ride  over  My  Lady  Leigh!) 

"  •  Build  it  up  with  stones  so  strong  — 

"  '  Build  it  up  with  gold  so  fine  ' — 

It  was  twenty  to  eight  and  Eonny  had  not  so  much  as 
begun  to  say  Good  night.  She  was  singing  her  song  to 
spin  out  the  time. 

"  '  London  Bridge  — '  " 

"  That'll  do,  Ronny,  it's  time  you  were  in  bed." 

There  was  no  need  for  her  to  linger  and  draw  out  her 

caresses,  no  need  to  be  afraid  of  going  to  bed   alone. 

Frances,  at  Vera's  request,  had  had  her  cot  moved  up 

into  the  night  nursery. 


VIII 

Anthony  had  begun  to  wonder  where  on  earth  he 
should  send  Morrie  out  to  this  time,  when  the  Boer  War 
came  and  solved  his  problem. 

Maurice,  joyous  and  adventurous  again,  sent  himself 
to  South  Africa,  to  enlist  in  the  Imperial  Light  Horse. 

Ferdie  Cameron  went  out  also  with  the  Second  Gordon 
Highlanders,   solving,   perhaps,   another  problem. 

"  It's  no  use  trying  to  be  sorry,  Mummy,"  Dorothy  said. 

Frances  knew  what  Anthony  was  thinking,  and  Anthony 
knew  it  was  what  Frances  thought  herself:  Supposing 
this  time  Morrie  didn't  come  back?  Then  that  problem 
would  be  solved  for  ever.  Frances  hated  problems  when 
they  worried  Anthony.  Anthony  detested  problems  when 
they  bothered  Frances. 

And  the  children  knew  what  they  were  thinking.  Doro- 
thy went  on. 

"  It's  all  rot  pretending  that  we  want  him  to  come  back." 

"  It  was  jolly  decent  of  him  to  enlist,"  said  Nicky. 

Dorothy  admitted  that  it  was  jolly  decent.  "  But,"  she 
said,  "  what  else  could  he  do  ?  His  only  chance  was  to 
go  away  and  do  something  so  jolly  plucky  that  we've 
ashamed  of  ourselves,  and  never  to  come  back  again  to 
spoil  it.  You  don't  want  him  to  spoil  it,  Mummy  ducky, 
do  you  ?  " 

Anthony  and  Frances  tried,  conscientiously  and  patri- 

76 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  77 

otically,  to  realize  the  Boer  War.  They  said  it  was  ter- 
rible to  have  it  hanging  over  them,  morning,  noon  and 
night.  But  it  didn't  really  hang  over  them.  It  hung 
over  a  country  that,  except  once  when  it  had  conveniently 
swallowed  up  Morrie,  they  had  never  thought  about  and 
could  not  care  for,  a  landscape  that  they  could  not  see. 
The  war  was  not  even  part  of  that  landscape;  it  re- 
fused to  move  over  it  in  any  traceable  course.  It  simply 
hung,  or  lay  as  one  photographic  film  might  lie  upon  an- 
other. It  was  not  their  fault.  They  tried  to  see  it. 
They  bought  the  special  editions  of  the  evening  papers; 
they  read  the  military  dispatches  and  the  stories  of  the 
war  correspondents  from  beginning  to  end;  they  stared 
blankly  at  the  printed  columns  that  recorded  the  dis- 
asters of  Nicholson's  Nek,  and  Colenso  and  Spion  Kop. 
But  the  forms  were  grey  and  insubstantial ;  it  was  all  flat 
and  grey  like  the  pictures  in  the  illustrated  papers;  the 
very  blood  of  it  ran  grey. 

It  wasn't  real.  For  Frances  the  brown  walls  of  the 
house,  the  open  wings  of  its  white  shutters,  the  green 
garden  and  the  tree  of  Heaven  were  real;  so  were  Jack 
Straw's  Castle  and  Harrow  on  the  Hill ;  morning  and  noon 
and  night  were  real,  and  getting  up  and  dressing  and 
going  to  bed;  most  real  of  all  the  sight  and  sound  and 
touch  of  her  husband  and  her  children. 

Only  now  and  then  the  vision  grew  solid  and  stood 
firm.  Frances  carried  about  with  her  distinct  images  of 
Maurice,  to  which  she  could  attach  the  rest.  Thus  she 
had  an  image  of  Long  Tom,  an  immense  slender  muzzle, 
tilted  up  over  a  high  ridge,  nosing  out  Maurice. 

Maurice  was  shut  up  in  Ladysmith. 


78  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Don't  worry,  Mummy.  That'll  keep  him  out  of  mis- 
chief.    Daddy  said  he  ought  to  be  shut  up  somewhere." 

"  He's  starving,  Dorothy.  He  won't  have  anything  to 
eat." 

"  Or  drink,  ducky." 

"  Oh,  you're  cruel !     Don't  be  cruel !  " 

"  I'm  not  cruel.  If  I  didn't  care  so  awfully  for  you, 
Mummy,  I  shouldn't  mind  whether  he  came  back  or  didn't. 
You're  cruel.  You  ought  to  think  of  Grannie  and  Auntie 
Louie  and  Auntie  Emmy  and  Auntie  Edie." 

"  At  the  moment,"  said  Trances,  "  I  am  thinking  of 
Uncle  Morrie." 

She  was  thinking  of  him,  not  as  he  actually  was,  but  as 
he  had  been,  as  a  big  boy  like  Michael,  as  a  little  boy 
like  John,  two  years  younger  than  she;  a  little  boy  by 
turns  spoiled  and  thwarted,  who  contrived,  nevertheless, 
to  get  most  things  that  he  happened  to  want  by  crying 
for  them,  though  everybody  else  went  without.  And  in 
the  grown-up  Morrie's  place,  under  the  shells  of  Lady- 
smith,  she  saw  Nicky. 

For  Nicky  had  declared  his  intention  of  going  into 
the  Army. 

"  And  7'm  thinking  of  Morrie,"  Dorothy  said.  "  I 
don't  want  him  to  miss  it." 


Frances  and  Anthony  had  hung  out  flags  for  Mafeking; 
Dorothy  and  Nicky,  mounted  on  bicycles,  had  been  career- 
ing through  the  High  Street  with  flags  flying  from  their 
handlebars.  Michael  was  a  Pro-Boer  and  flew  no  flags. 
All  these  things  irritated  Maurice. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  79 

He  had  come  back  again.  He  had  missed  it,  as  he  had 
missed  all  the  chances  that  were  ever  given  him.  A 
slight  wound  kept  him  in  hospital  throughout  the  greater 
part  of  the  siege,  and  he  had  missed  the  sortie  of  his 
squadron  and  the  taking  of  the  guns  for  which  Ferdie 
Cameron  got  his  promotion  and  his  D.S.O.  He  had  come 
back  in  the  middle  of  the  war  with  nothing  but  a  bullet 
wound  in  his  left  leg  to  prove  that  he  had  taken  part  in  it. 

The  part  he  had  taken  had  not  sobered  Maurice.  It 
had  only  depressed  him.  And  depression  after  prolonged, 
brutal  abstinence  broke  down  the  sheer  strength  by  which 
sometimes  he  stretched  a  period  of  sobriety  beyond  its 
natural  limits. 

For  there  were  two  kinds  of  drinking:  great  drinking 
that  came  seldom  and  was  the  only  thing  that  counted, 
and  ordinary  drinking  that,  though  it  went  on  most  of  the 
time,  brought  no  satisfaction  and  didn't  count  at  all.  And 
there  were  two  states  of  drunkenness  to  correspond:  one 
intense  and  vivid,  without  memory,  transcending  all  other 
states;  and  one  that  was  no  more  remarkable  than  any 
other.  Before  the  war  Morrie's  great  drinking  came 
seldom,  by  fits  and  bursts  and  splendid  unlasting  uprushes ; 
after  the  war  the  two  states  tended  to  approach  till  they 
merged  in  one  continual  sickly  soaking.  And  while  other 
important  and  outstanding  things,  and  things  that  he 
really  wanted  to  remember,  disappeared  in  the  poisonous 
flood  let  loose  in  Morrie's  memory,  he  never  for  one  mo- 
ment lost  sight  of  the  fact  that  it  was  he  and  not  Anthony, 
his  brother-in-law,  who  had  enlisted  and  was  wounded. 

He  was  furious  with  his  mother  and  sisters  for  not 
realizing  the  war.     He  was   furious  with   Frances   and 


8o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Anthony.  Not  realizing  the  war  meant  not  realizing 
what  he  had  been  through.  He  swore  by  some  queer  God 
of  his  that  he  would  make  them  realize  it.  The  least  they 
could  do  for  him  was  to  listen  to  what  he  had  to  say. 

"  You  people  here  don't  know  what  war  is.  You  think 
it's  all  glory  and  pluck,  and  dashing  out  and  blowing  up 
the  enemy's  guns,  and  the  British  flag  flying,  and 
wounded  pipers  piping  all  the  time  and  not  caring  a  damn. 
Nobody  caring  a  damn. 

"  And  it  isn't.  It's  dirt  and  funk  and  stinks  and  more 
funk  all  the  time.  It's  lying  out  all  night  on  the  beastly 
veldt,  and  going  to  sleep  and  getting  frozen,  and  waking 
up  and  finding  you've  got  warm  again  because  your  neigh- 
bour's inside's  been  fired  out  on  the  top  of  you.  You 
get  wounded  when  the  stretcher-bearers  aren't  anywhere 
about,  and  you  crawl  over  to  the  next  poor  devil  and  lie 
back  to  back  with  him  to  keep  warm.  And  just  when 
you've  dropped  off  to  sleep  you  wake  up  shivering,  because 
he's  died  of  a  wound  he  didn't  know  he'd  got. 

"  You'll  find  a  chap  lying  on  his  back  all  nice  and 
comfy,  and  when  you  start  to  pick  him  up  you  can't  lift 
him  because  his  head's  glued  to  the  ground.  You  try  a 
bit,  gently,  and  the  flesh  gives  way  like  rotten  fruit,  and 
the  bone  like  a  cup  you've  broken  and  stuck  together  with- 
out any  seccotine,  and  you  heave  up  a  body  with  half  a 
head  on  it.  And  all  the  brains  are  in  the  other  half,  the 
one  that's  glued  down.     That's  war. 

"  Huh !  "  He  threw  out  his  breath  with  a  jerk  of 
contempt.  It  seemed  to  him  that  neither  Frances  nor 
Anthony  was  listening  to  him.  They  were  not  looking 
at  him.     They  didn't  want  to  listen;  they  didn't  want  to 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  81 

look  at  him.  He  couldn't  touch  them;  he  couldn't  evoke 
one  single  clear  image  in  their  minds ;  there  was  no  horror 
he  could  name  that  would  sting  them  to  vision,  to  realiza- 
tion.    They  had  not  been  there. 

Dorothy  and  Michael  and  Nicky  were  listening.  The 
three  kids  had  imagination ;  they  could  take  it  in.  They 
stared  as  if  he  had  brought  those  horrors  into  the  room. 
But  even  they  missed  the  reality  of  it.  They  saw  every- 
thing he  meant  them  to  see,  except  him.  It  was  as  if  they 
were  in  the  conspiracy  to  keep  him  out  of  it. 

He  glared  at  Frances  and  Anthony.  What  was  the 
good  of  telling  them,  of  trying  to  make  them  realize  it? 
If  they'd  only  given  some  sign,  made  some  noise  or  some 
gesture,  or  looked  at  him,  he  might  have  spared  them. 
But  the  stiff,  averted  faces  of  Frances  and  Anthony  an- 
noyed him. 

"  And  if  you're  a  poor  wretched  Tommy  like  me,  you'll 
have  to  sweat  in  a  brutal  sun,  hauling  up  cases  of  fizz  from 
the  railway  up  country  to  Headquarters,  with  a  thirst 
on  you  that  frizzles  your  throat.  You  see  the  stuff  shin- 
ing and  spluttering,  and  you  go  mad.  You  could  kill  the 
man  if  you  were  to  see  him  drink  it,  when  you  know  there's 
nothing  for  you  but  a  bucket  of  green  water  with  typhoid 
germs  swimming  about  in  it.     That's  war. 

"  You  think  you're  lucky  if  you're  wounded  and  get 
bumped  down  in  a  bullock  wagon  thirty  miles  to  the  base 
hospital.  But  the  best  thing  you  can  do  then  is  to  pop 
off.  For  if  you  get  better  they  make  you  hospital  orderly. 
And  the  hospital  orderly  has  to  clean  up  all  the  muck  of 
the  butcher's  shop  from  morning  to  night.  When  you're 
so  sick  you  can't  stand  you  get  your  supper,  dry  bread  and 


82  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

bully  beef.  The  bully  beef  reminds  you  of  things,  and 
the  bread  —  well,  the  bread's  all  nice  and  white  on  the 
top.  But  when  you  turn  it  over  on  the  other  side  —  it's 
red.     That's  war." 

Frances  looked  at  him.  He  thought :  "  At  last  she's 
turned  ;  at  last  I've  touched  her ;  she  can  realize  that." 

"  Morrie  dear,  it  must  have  been  awful,"  she  said. 
"  It's  too  awful.  I  don't  mind  your  telling  me  and  An- 
thony about  it;  but  I'd  rather  you  did  it  when  the  chil- 
dren aren't  in  the  room." 

"Is  that  all  you  think  about?  The  children?  The 
children.  You  don't  care  a  tinker's  cuss  about  the  war. 
You  don't  care  a  damn  what  happens  to  me  or  anybody 
else.  What  does  it  matter  who's  wounded  or  who's  killed, 
as  long  as  it  isn't  one  of  your  own  kids  ? 

"  I'm  simply  trying  to  tell  you  what  war  is.  It's  dirt 
and  stink  and  funk.  That's  all  it  is.  And  there's  pre- 
cious little  glory  in  it,  Nicky." 

"  If  the  Boers  won  there  would  be  glory,"  Michael 
said. 

"  Not  even  if  the  Boers  won,"  said  Maurice. 

"  Certainly  not  if  the  Boers  won,"  said  Anthony. 

"  You'll  say  next  there'd  be  no  glory  if  there  was  war 
between  England  and  Ireland  and  the  Irish  won.  And 
yet  there  would  be  glory." 

"  Would  there  ?  Go  and  read  history  and  don't  talk 
rot." 

"  I  have  read  it,"  said  Michael. 

Frances  thought :  "  He  doesn't  know  what  he's  talk- 
ing about.     Why  should  he?     He's  barely  thirteen.     I 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  83 

can't  think  where  he  gets  these  ideas  from.     But  he'll 
grow  out  of  them." 

It  was  not  Maurice  that  she  saw  in  Maurice's  war-pic- 
tures. But  he  had  made  them  realize  what  war  was ;  and 
they  vowed  that  as  long  as  they  lived  not  one  of  their  sons 
should  have  anything  to  do  with  it. 


In  the  spring  of  nineteen-one  Anthony  sent  Maurice 
out  to  California.     The  Boer  War  was  ended. 

Another  year,  and  the  vision  of  war  passed  from  Frances 
as  if  it  had  never  been. 


IX 

Michael  was  unhappy. 

The  almond  trees  flowered  in  front  of  the  white  houses 
in  the  strange  white  streets. 

White  squares,  white  terraces,  white  crescents;  at  the 
turn  of  the  roads  the  startling  beauty  of  the  trees  covered 
with  pink  blossoms,  hot  against  the  hot  white  walls. 

After  the  pink  blossoms,  green  leaves  and  a  strange 
white  heat  everywhere.  You  went,  from  pavements  burn- 
ing white,  down  long  avenues  grey-white  under  the 
shadows  of  the  limes. 

A  great  Promenade  going  down  like  a  long  green  tun- 
nel, from  the  big  white  Hotel  at  the  top  to  the  High 
Street  at  the  bottom  of  the  basin  where  the  very  dregs 
of  the  heat  sank  and  thickened. 

Promenade  forbidden  for  no  earthly  reason  that 
Michael  could  see,  except  that  it  was  beautiful.  Hotel 
where  his  father  gave  him  dinner  on  his  last  day  of  blessed 
life,  telling  him  to  choose  what  he  liked  best,  as  the  con- 
demned criminal  chooses  his  last  meal  on  the  day  they 
hang  him. 

Cleeve  Hill  and  Battledown  and  Birdlip,  and  the  long 
rampart  of  Leckhampton,  a  thin,  curling  bristle  of  small 
trees  on  the  edge  of  it ;  forms  that  made  an  everlasting 
pattern  on  his  mind ;  forms  that  haunted  him  at  night  and 
tempted  and  tormented  him  all  day.  Memory  which  it 
would  have  been  better  for  him  if  he  had  not  had,  of 

84 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  85 

the  raking  open  country  over  the  top,  of  broad  white  light 
and  luminous  blue  shadows,  of  white  roads  switchback- 
ing  through  the  sheep  pastures;  fields  of  bright  yellow 
mustard  in  flower  on  the  lower  hills;  then,  rectangular 
fir  plantations  and  copses  of  slender  beech  trees  in  the 
hollows.  Somewhere,  far-off,  the  Severn,  faint  and  still, 
like  a  river  in  a  dream. 

Memory  of  the  round  white  town  in  the  round  pit  of 
the  valley,  shining,  smoking  through  the  thick  air  and 
the  white  orchard  blossoms ;  memory  saturated  by  a  smell 
that  is  like  no  other  smell  on  earth,  the  delicate  smell  of 
the  Midland  limestone  country,  the  smell  of  clean  white 
dust,  and  of  grass  drying  in  the  sun  and  of  mustard  flow- 
ers, 

Michael  was  in  Cheltenham. 

It  was  a  matter  of  many  unhappinesses,  not  one  un- 
happiness.  A  sudden  intolerable  unhappiness,  the  flash 
and  stab  of  the  beauty  of  the  almond-flowers,  seen  in  pass- 
ing and  never  seized,  beauty  which  it  would  have  been 
better  for  him  if  he  had  not  seen ;  the  knowledge,  which 
he  ought  never  to  have  had,  that  this  beauty  had  to  die, 
was  killed  because  he  had  not  seized  it,  when,  if  he  could 
but  have  held  it  for  one  minute,  it  would  have  been  im- 
mortal. A  vague,  light  unhappiness  that  came  sometimes, 
he  could  not  for  the  life  of  him  think  why,  from  the  sight 
of  his  own  body  stripped,  and  from  the  feeling  of  his 
own  muscles.  There  was  sadness  for  him  in  his  very 
strength.  A  long,  aching  unhappiness  that  came  with  his 
memory  of  the  open  country  over  the  tops  of  the  hills, 
which,  in  their  incredible  stupidity  and  cruelty,  they  had 
let  him  see.     A  quick,  lacerating  unhappiness  when  he 


86  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

thought  of  his  mother,  and  of  the  garden  on  the  Heath, 
and  the  high  ridge  of  the  Spaniards'  Road,  and  London 
below  it,  immense  and  beautiful. 

The  unhappiness  of  never  being  by  himself. 

He  was  afraid  of  the  herd.  It  was  with  him  night  and 
day.  He  was  afraid  of  the  thoughts,  the  emotions  that 
seized  it,  swaying,  moving  the  multitude  of  undeveloped 
souls  as  if  they  had  been  one  monstrous,  dominating  soul. 
He  was  afraid  of  their  voices,  when  they  chanted,  sang 
and  shouted  together.  He  loathed  their  slang  even  when 
he  used  it.  He  disliked  the  collective,  male  odour  of 
the  herd,  the  brushing  against  him  of  bodies  inflamed 
with  running,  the  steam  of  their  speed  risiug  through 
their  hot  sweaters ;  and  the  smell  of  dust  and  ink  and 
india-rubber  and  resinous  wood  in  the  warm  class-rooms. 

Michael  was  at  school. 

The  thing  he  had  dreaded,  that  had  hung  over  him, 
threatening  him  for  years  before  it  happened,  had  hap- 
pened. Nothing  could  have  prevented  it ;  their  names  had 
been  down  for  Cheltenham  long  ago;  first  his,  then 
Nicky's.  Cheltenham,  because  Bartie  and  Vera  lived 
there,  and  because  it  had  a  college  for  girls,  and  Doro- 
thy, who  wanted  to  go  to  Roedean,  had  been  sent  to  Chel- 
tenham, because  of  Bartie  and  Vera  and  for  no  other 
reason.  First  Dorothy ;  then,  he,  Michael ;  then,  the 
next  term,  Nicky.  And  Nicky  had  been  sent  (a  whole 
year  before  his  time)  because  of  Michael,  in  the  hope 
that  Michael  would  settle  down  better  if  he  had  his 
brother  with  him.     It  didn't  seem  reasonable. 

Not  that  either  Dorothy  or  Nicky  minded  when  they 
got   there.     All   that   Nicky   minded    was   not   being   at 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  87 

Hampstead.  Being  at  Cheltenham  he  did  not  mind  at 
all.  He  rather  liked  it,  since  Major  Cameron  had  come 
to  9tay  just  outside  it  —  on  purpose  to  annoy  Bartie  — 
and  took  them  out  riding.  Even  Michael  did  not  mind 
Cheltenham  more  than  any  other  place  his  people  might 
have  chosen.  He  was  not  unreasonable.  All  he  asked 
was  to  be  let  alone,  and  to  have  room  to  breathe  and 
get  ahead  in.  As  it  was,  he  had  either  to  go  with  the 
school  mass,  or  waste  energy  in  resisting  its  poisonous 
impact. 

He  had  chosen  resistance. 

Tudor  House. 

Cheltenham, 

Sunday. 
Deadest  Mother: 

I've  put  Sunday  on  this  letter,  though  it's  really  Friday, 
because  I'm  supposed  to  be  writing  it  on  Sunday  when  the 
other  fellows  are  writing.  That's  the  beastly  thing  about 
this  place,  you're  expected  to  do  everything  when  the 
other  fellows  are  doing  it,  whether  you  want  to  or  not, 
as  if  the  very  fact  that  they're  doing  it  too  didn't  make  you 
hate  it. 

I'm  writing  now  because  I  simply  must.  If  I  waited 
till  Sunday  I  mightn't  want  to,  and  anyhow  I  shouldn't 
remember  a  single  thing  I  meant  to  say.  Even  now  John- 
son minor's  digging  his  skinny  elbows  into  one  side  of  me, 
and  Hartley  major's  biting  the  feathers  off  his  pen  and 
spitting  them  out  again  on  the  other.  But  they're  only 
supposed  to  be  doing  Latin  verse,  so  it  doesn't  matter  so 
much.  What  I  mean  is  it's  as  if  their  beastly  minds  kept 
on  leaking  into  yours  till  you're  all  mixed  up  with  them. 
That's  why  I  asked  Daddy  to  take  me  away  next  term. 
You  see  —  it's  more  serious  than  he  thinks  —  it  is,  really. 
You've  no  idea  what  it's  like.     You've  got  to  swot  every 


88  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

blessed  thing  the  other  fellows  swot  even  if  you  can't  do 
it,  and  whether  it's  going  to  be  any  good  to  you  or  not. 
Why,  you're  expected  to  sleep  when  they're  sleeping,  even 
if  the  chap  next  you  snores.  Daddy  might  remember  that 
it's  Kicky  who  likes  mathematics,  not  me.  It's  all  very 
well  for  Nicky  when  he  wants  to  go  into  the  Army  all  the 
time.  There  are  things  I  want  to  do.  I  want  to  write 
and  I'm  going  to  write.  Daddy  can't  keep  me  off  it. 
And  I  don't  believe  he'd  want  to  if  he  understood. 
There's  nothing  else  in  the  world  I'll  ever  be  any  good  at. 

And  there  are  things  I  want  to  know.  I  want  to  know 
Greek  and  Latin  and  French  and  German  and  Italian  and 
Spanish,  and  Old  French  and  Russian  and  Chinese  and 
Japanese,  oh,  and  Provengal,  and  every  blessed  language 
that  has  or  has  had  a  literature.  I  can  learn  languages 
quite  fast.  Do  you  suppose  I've  got  a  chance  of  knowing 
one  of  them  —  really  knowing  —  even  if  I  had  the  time  ? 
Not  much.  And  that's  where  being  here's  so  rotten. 
They  waste  your  time  as  if  it  was  theirs,  not  yours. 
They've  simply  no  notion  of  the  value  of  it.  They  seem 
to  think  time  doesn't  matter  because  you're  young.  Fancy 
taking  three  months  over  a  Greek  play  you  can  read  in 
three  hours.     That'll  give  you  some  idea. 

It  all  comes  of  being  in  a  beastly  form  and  having  to 
go  with  the  other  fellows.  Say  they're  thirty  fellows 
in  your  form,  and  twenty-nine  stick ;  you've  got  to  stick 
with  them,  if  it's  terms  and  terms.  They  can't  do  it  any 
other  way.  It's  because  I'm  young,  Mummy,  that  I  mind 
so  awfully.  Supposing  I  died  in  ten  years'  time,  or  even 
fifteen  ?     It  simply  makes  me  hate  everybody. 

Love  to  Daddy  and  Don. 

Your  loving  Mick. 

P.S. —  I  don't  mean  that  Hartley  major  isn't  good  at 
Latin  verse.  He  is.  He  can  lick  me  into  fits  when  he's 
bitten  all  the  feathers  off. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  89 

Tudor  House. 

Cheltenham, 

_  ,  r  Tuesday. 

Darling  Mummy: 

Daddy  doesn't  understand.  You  only  think  he  does 
because  you  like  him.  It's  all  rot  what  he  says  about 
esprit  de  corps,  the  putridest  rot,  though  I  know  he  doesn't 
mean  it. 

And  he's  wrong  about  gym,  and  drill  and  games  and  all 
that.  I  don't  mind  gym,  and  I  don't  mind  drill,  and  I 
like  games.  I'm  fairly  good  at  most  of  them  —  except 
footer.  All  the  fellows  say  I'm  fairly  good  —  otherwise 
I  don't  suppose  they'd  stick  me  for  a  minute.  I  don't 
even  mind  Chapel.  You  see,  when  it's  only  your  body 
doing  what  the  other  chaps  do,  it  doesn't  seem  to  matter. 
If  esprit  de  corps  was  esprit  de  corps  it  would  be  all  right. 
But  it's  esprit  d'esprit.  And  it's  absolutely  sickening  the 
things  they  can  do  to  your  mind.  I  can't  stand  another 
term  of  it. 

Always  your  loving 

Mick. 

P.S. —  How  do  you  know  I  shan't  be  dead  in  ten  or 
fifteen  years'  time?     It's  enough  to  make  me. 

P.P.S.— It's  all  very  well  for  Daddy  to  talk  —  he 
doesn't  want  to  learn  Chinese. 

Tudor  House. 

Cheltenham, 

-r.         -r,  Thursday. 

Dear  Iather:  ° 

All  right.  Have  it  your  own  way.  Only  I  shall  kill 
myself.  You  needn't  tell  Mother  that  —  though  it  won't 
matter  so  much  as  she'll  very  likely  think.  And  perhaps 
then  you  won't  try  and  stop  Nicky  going  into  the  Army 
as  you've  stopped  me. 

I  don't  care  a  "  ram,"  as  Nicky  would  say,  whether  you 
bury  me  or  cremate  me ;  only  you  might  give  my  Theocri- 


go  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

tus  to  old  Parsons,  and  my  revolver  to  Nicky  if  it  doesn't 
burst.     He'd  like  it. 

Michael. 

P.S. —  If  Parsons  would  rather  have  my  iEschylus  he 
can,  or  both. 

Tudor  House. 

Cheltenham, 

Sunday. 
Darling  Mummy  : 

It's  your  turn  for  a  letter.  Do  you  think  Daddy'd 
let  me  turn  the  hen-house  into  a  work-shop  next  holidays, 
as  there  aren't  any  hens  ?  And  would  he  give  me  a  proper 
lathe  for  turning  steel  and  brass  and  stuff  for  my  next 
birthday  ?  I'm  afraid  it'll  cost  an  awful  lot ;  but  he 
could  take  it  out  of  my  other  birthdays,  I  don't  mind 
how  many  so  long  as  I  can  have  the  lathe  this  one. 

This  place  isn't  half  bad  once  you  get  used  to  it.  I 
like  the  fellows,  and  all  the  masters  are  really  jolly  de- 
cent, though  I  wish  we  had  old  Parsons  here  instead  of 
the  one  we  have  to  do  Greek  for.  He's  an  awful  chap 
to  make  you  swot. 

I  don't  know  what  you  mean  about  Mick  being  seedy. 
He's  as  fit  as  fit.  You  should  see  him  when  he's  stripped. 
But  he  hates  the  place  like  poison  half  the  time.  He 
can't  stand  being  with  a  lot  of  fellows.  He's  a  rum  chap 
because  they  all  like  him  no  end,  the  masters  and  the 
fellows,  though  they  think  he's  funny,  all  except  Hartley 
major,  but  he's  such  a  measly  little  blighter  that  he 
doesn't  count. 

We  had  a  ripping  time  last  Saturday.  Bartie  went  up 
to  town,  and  Major  Cameron  took  Dorothy  and  Ronny 
and  Vera  and  me  and  Mick  to  Birdlip  in  his  dog-cart, 
only  Mick  and  me  had  to  bike  because  there  wasn't  room 
enough.  However  we  grabbed  the  chains  behind  and  the 
dog-cart  pulled  us  up  the  hills  like  anything,   and  we 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  91 

could  talk  to  Dorothy  and  Ronny  without  having  to  yell 
at  each  other.     He  did  us  jolly  well  at  tea  afterwards. 

Dorothy  rode  my  bike  stridelegs  coming  back,  so  that 
I  could  sit  in  the  dog-cart.  tShe  said  she'd  get  a  jolly  wig- 
ging if  she  was  seen.     We  shan't  know  till  Monday. 

You  know,  Mummy,  that  kid  Roimy's  having  a  rotten 
time,  what  with  Bartie  being  such  a  beast  and  Vera  chum- 
ming up  with  Ferdie  and  going  off  to  country  houses  where 
he  is.  I  really  think  she'd  better  come  to  us  for  the 
holidays.  Then  I  could  teach  her  to  ride.  Bartie  won't 
let  her  learn  here,  though  Ferdie'd  gone  and  bought  a  pony 
for  her.  That  was  to  spite  Ferdie.  He's  worse  than 
ever,  if  you  can  imagine  that,  and  he's  got  three  more 
things  the  matter  with  him. 

I  must  stop  now. 

Love  to  Dad  and  Don  and  Nanna.  Next  year  I'm  to 
go  into  physics  and  stinks  —  that's  chemistry. 

Your  loving  Nicky. 

The  Leas.     Pababola  Road. 

Cheltenham, 

Sunday. 
Deaeest  Mummy  : 

I'm  awfully  sorry  you  don't  like  my  last  term's  school 
report.  I  know  it  wasn't  what  it  ought  to  have  been. 
I  have  to  hold  myself  in  so  as  to  keep  in  the  same  class 
with  Rosalind  when  we're  moved  up  after  Midsummer. 
But  as  she's  promised  me  faithfully  she'll  let  herself  rip 
next  term,  you'll  see  it'll  be  all  right  at  Xmas.  We'll 
both  be  in  I  A  the  Midsummer  after,  and  we  can  go  in 
for  our  matic.  together.  I  wish  you'd  arrange  with  Mrs. 
Jervis  for  both  of  us  to  be  at  Newnham  at  the  same 
time.  Tell  her  Rosalind's  an  awful  slacker  if  I'm  not 
there  to  keep  her  up  to  the  mark.  No  —  don't  tell  her 
that.     Tell  her  I'm  a  slacker  if  she  isn't  there. 

I  was  amused  by  your  saying  it  was  decent  of  Bartie  to 
have  us  so  often.     He  only  does  it  because  things  are 


92  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

getting  so  tight  between  him  and  Vera  that  he's  glad 
of  anything  that  relaxes  the  strain  a  bit.  Even  us.  He's 
snappier  than  ever  with  Ronny.  I  can't  think  how  the 
poor  kid  stands  it. 

You  know  that  ripping  white  serge  coat  and  skirt  you 
sent  me?  Well,  the  skirt's  not  nearly  long  enough.  It 
doesn't  matter  a  bit  though,  because  I  can  keep  it  for 
hockey.  It's  nice  having  a  mother  who  can  choose  clothes. 
You  should  see  the  last  blouse  Mrs.  Jervis  got  for  Rosa- 
lind. She's  burst  out  of  all  the  seams  already.  You 
could  have  heard  her  doing  it. 

Much  love  to  you  and  Daddy  and  Don-Don.  I  can't 
send  any  to  Mr.  Parsons  now  my  hair's  up.  But  you 
might  tell  him  I'm  going  in  strong  for  Sociology  and 
Economics. — 

Your  loving 

Doeothy. 

P.S. —  Vera  asked  me  if  I  thought  you'd  take  her  and 
Ronny  in  at  Midsummer.  I  said  of  course  you  would  — 
like  a  shot. 

Lansdown  Lodge. 

Cheltenham, 

Friday. 
My  Dearest  Frances: 

I  hope  you  got  my  two  wires  in  time.  You  needn't 
come  down,  either  of  you.  And  you  needn't  worry  about 
Mick.  Ferdie  went'round  and  talked  to  him  like  a  fa  — 
I  mean  a  big  brother,  and  the  revolver  (bless  his  heart !)  is 
at  present  reposing  at  the  bottom  of  my  glove-box. 

All  the  same  we  both  think  you'd  better  take  him  away 
at  Midsummer.  He  says  he  can  stick  it  till  then,  but  not 
a  day  longer.  Poor  Mick !  He  has  the  most  mysterious 
troubles. 

I  daresay  it's  the  Cheltenham  climate  as  much  as  any- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  93 

thing.  It  doesn't  suit  me  or  Ronny  either,  and  it's  simply 
killing  Ferdie  by  inches.  I  suppose  that's  why  Bartie 
makes  us  stay  here  —  in  the  hope  — 

Oh!  my  dear,  I'm  worried  out  of  my  life  about  him. 
He's  never  got  over  that  fever  he  had  in  South  Africa. 
He's  looking  ghastly. 

And  the  awful  thing  is  that  I  can't  do  a  thing  for  him. 
Not  a  thing.     Unless  — 

You  haven't  forgotten  the  promise  you  made  me  two 
years  ago,  have  you  ? 

Dorothy  seemed  to  think  you  could  put  Ronny  and  me 
up  —  again !  —  at  Midsummer.  Can  you  ?  And  if  poor 
Ferdie  wants  to  come  and  see  us,  you  won't  turn  him  off 
your  door-mat,  will  you? 

Your  lovingest 

"  Veea." 

Frances  said,  "  Poor  Vera !  She  even  makes  poor  Mick 
an  excuse  for  seeing  Ferdie." 


Thkee  more  years  passed  and  Frances  had  fulfilled  her 
promise.     She  had  taken  Veronica. 

The  situation  had  become  definite.  Bartie  had  de- 
livered his  ultimatum.  Either  Vera  must  give  up  Major 
Cameron,  signing  a  written  pledge  in  the  presence  of 
three  witnesses,  Frances,  Anthony  and  Bartie's  solicitor, 
that  she  would  neither  see  him  nor  write  to  him,  nor  hold 
any  sort  or  manner  of  communication  with  him,  direct  or 
indirect,  or  he  would  obtain  a  judicial  separation.  It 
was  to  be  clearly  understood  by  both  of  them  that  he 
would  not,  in  any  circumstances,  divorce  her.  Bartie 
knew  that  a  divorce  was  what  they  wanted,  what  they 
had  been  playing  for,  and  he  was  not  going  to  make 
things  easy  for  them;  he  was  going  to  make  things  hard 
and  bitter  and  shameful.  He  had  based  his  ultimatum 
on  the  calculation  that  Vera  would  not  have  the  courage 
of  her  emotions;  that  even  her  passion  would  surrender 
when  she  found  that  it  had  no  longer  the  protection  of 
her  husband's  house  and  name.  Besides  Vera  was  ex- 
pensive, and  Cameron  was  a  spendthrift  on  an  insufficient 
income;  he  could  not  possibly  afford  her.  If  Bartie's 
suspicions  were  correct,  the  thing  had  been  going  on  for 
the  last  twelve  years,  and  if  in  twelve  years'  time  they 
had  not  forced  his  hand  that  was  because  they  had  counted 
the  cost,  and  decided  that,  as  Frances  had  put  it,  the 
"  game  was  not  worth  the  scandal." 

94 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  95 

For  when  suspicion  became  unendurable  he  had  con- 
sulted Anthony  who  assured  him  that  Frances,  who  ought 
to  know,  was  convinced  that  there  was  nothing  in  it  ex- 
cept incompatibility,  for  which  Bartie  was  superlatively 
responsible. 

Anthony's  manner  did  not  encourage  confidence,  and 
he  gathered  that  his  own  more  sinister  interpretation 
would  be  dismissed  with  contemptuous  incredulity. 
Anthony  was  under  his  wife's  thumb  and  Frances  had 
been  completely  bamboozled  by  her  dearest  friend.  Still, 
when  once  their  eyes  were  opened,  he  reckoned  on  the 
support  of  Anthony  and  Frances.  It  was  inconceivable, 
that,  faced  with  a  public  scandal,  his  brother  and  his 
sister-in-law  would  side  with  Vera. 

It  was  a  game  where  Bartie  apparently  held  all  the 
cards.     And  his  trump  card  was  Veronica. 

He  was  not  going  to  keep  Veronica  without  Vera. 
That  had  been  tacitly  understood  between  them  long  ago. 
If  Vera  went  to  Cameron  she  could  not  take  Veronica 
with  her  without  openly  confirming  Bartie's  worst  sus- 
picion. 

And  yet  all  these  things,  so  inconceivable  to  Bartie, 
happened.  When  it  came  to  the  stabbing  point  the  cour- 
age of  Vera's  emotions  was  such  that  she  defied  her  hus- 
band and  his  ultimatum,  and  went  to  Cameron.  By  that 
time  Ferdie  was  so  ill  that  she  would  have  been  ashamed 
of  herself  if  she  had  not  gone.  And  though  Anthony's 
house  was  not  open  to  the  unhappy  lovers,  Trances  and 
Anthony  had  taken  Veronica. 

Grannie  and  Auntie  Louie  and  Auntie  Emmeline  and 
Auntie  Edie  came  over  to  West  End  House  when  they 


96  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

heard  that  it  had  been  decided.  It  was  time,  they  said, 
that  somebody  should  protest,  that  somebody  should  ad- 
vise Frances  for  her  own  good  and  for  the  good  of  her 
children. 

They  had  always  detested  and  distrusted  Vera  Harri- 
son; they  had  always  known  what  would  happen.  The 
wonder  was  it  had  not  happened  before.  But  why  Fran- 
ces should  make  it  easy  for  her,  why  Frances  should 
shoulder  Vera  Harrison's  responsibilities,  and  burden 
herself  with  that  child,  and  why  Anthony  should  give  his 
consent  to  such  a  proceeding,  was  more  than  they  could 
imagine. 

Once  Frances  had  stood  up  for  the  three  Aunties 
against  Grannie ;  now  Grannie  and  the  three  Aunties  were 
united  against  Frances. 

"  Frances,  you're  a  foolish  woman." 

"  My  folly  is  my  own  affair  and  Anthony's." 

"  You'll  have  to  pay  for  it  some  day." 

"  You  might  have  thought  of  your  own  children  first." 

"  I  did.  I  thought,  How  would  I  like  them  to  be  for- 
saken like  poor  Ronny  ?  " 

"  You  should  have  thought  of  the  boys.  Michael's 
growing  up;  so  is  Nicky." 

"  Nicky  is  fifteen ;  Eonny  is  eleven,  if  you  call  that 
growing  up." 

"  That's  all  very  well,  but  when  Nicky  is  twenty-one 
and  Ronny  is  seventeen  what  are  you  going  to  do  ?  " 

"  I'm  not  going  to  turn  Ronny  out  of  doors  for  fear 
Nicky  should  fall  in  love  with  her,  if  that's  what  you 
mean." 

"  It  is  what  I  mean,  now  you've  mentioned  it." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  97 

"  He's  less  likely  to  fall  in  love  with  her  if  I  bring 
them  up  as  brother  and  sister." 

"  You  might  think  of  Anthony.  Bartholomew's  wife 
leaves  him  for  another  man,  and  you  aid  and  abet  her  by 
taking  her  child,  relieving  her  of  her  one  responsibility." 

"  Bartie's  wife  leaves  him,  and  we  help  Bartie  by  taking 
care  of  his  child  —  who  is  our  niece,  not  yours." 

"  My  dear  Frances,  that  attitude  isn't  going  to  deceive 
anybody.  If  you  don't  think  of  Anthony  and  your  chil- 
dren, you  might  think  of  us.  We  don't  want  to  be  mixed 
up  in  this  perfectly  horrible  affair." 

"  How  are  you  mixed  up  in  it  ?  " 

"  Well,  after  all,  Frances,  we  are  the  family.  We  are 
your  sisters  and  your  mother  and  your  children's  grand- 
mother and  aunts." 

"  Then,"  said  Frances  with  decision,  "  you  must  try 
to  bear  it.  You  must  take  the  rough  with  the  smooth, 
as  Anthony  and  I  do." 

And  as  soon  as  she  had  said  it  she  was  sorry.  It  struck 
her  for  the  first  time  that  her  sisters  were  getting  old. 
It  was  no  use  for  Auntie  Louie,  more  red  and  more  rigid 
than  ever,  to  defy  the  imminence  of  her  forty-ninth  birth- 
day. Auntie  Emmy's  gestures,  her  mouthings  and  excite- 
ment, only  drew  attention  to  the  fact  that  she  was  forty- 
seven.  And  Edie,  why,  even  poor  little  Auntie  Edie 
was  forty-five.  Grannie,  dry  and  wiry,  hardly  looked 
older  than  Auntie  Edie. 

They  left  her,  going  stiffly,  in  offence.  And  again 
the  unbearable  pathos  of  them  smote  her.  The  poor 
Aunties.  She  was  a  brute  to  hurt  them.  She  still 
thought  of  them  as  Auntie  Louie,  Auntie  Emmy,  Auntie 


98  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Edie.  It  seemed  kinder;  for  thus  she  bestowed  upon 
them  a  colour  and  vitality  that,  but  for  her  and  for  her 
children,  they  would  not  have  had.  They  were  helpless, 
tiresome,  utterly  inefficient.  In  all  their  lives  they  had 
never  done  anything  vigorous  or  memorable.  They  were 
doomed  to  go  out  before  her  children;  when  they  were 
gone  they  would  be  gone  altogether.  Neither  Auntie 
Louie,  nor  Auntie  Emmy,  nor  Auntie  Edie  would  leave 
any  mark  or  sign  of  herself.  But  her  children  gave  them 
titles  by  which  they  would  be  remembered  after  they 
were  gone.  It  was  as  if  she  had  bestowed  on  them  a  lit- 
tle of  her  own  enduring  life. 

It  was  absurd  and  pathetic  that  they  should  think  that 
they  were  the  Family. 

But  however  sorry  she  was  for  them  she  could  not  allow 
them  to  dictate  to  her  in  matters  that  concerned  her  and 
Anthony  alone.  If  they  were  so  worried,  about  the 
scandal,  why  hadn't  they  the  sense  to  see  that  the  only 
way  to  meet  it  was  to  give  it  the  lie  by  taking  Bonny,  by 
behaving  as  if  Bonny  were  unquestionably  Bartie's 
daughter  and  their  niece?  They  were  bound  to  do  it,  if 
not  for  Vera's  sake,  for  the  dear  little  girl's  sake.  And 
that  was  what  Vera  had  been  thinking  of;  that  was  why 
she  had  trusted  them. 

But  her  three  sisters  had  always  disliked  Vera.  They 
disliked  her  because,  while  they  went  unmarried,  Vera, 
not  content  with  the  one  man  who  was  her  just  and  legal 
portion,  had  taken  another  man  whom  she  had  no  right 
to.     And  Auntie  Emmeline  had  been  in  love  with  Ferdie. 

Still,  there  was  a  certain  dreadful  truth  in  their  re- 
proaches; and  it  stung.     Frances  said  to  herself  that  she 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  99 

had  not  been  wise.  She  had  done  a  risky  thing  in  tak- 
ing Ronny.  It  was  not  fair  to  her  children,  to  Michael 
and  Nicholas  and  John.  She  was  afraid.  She  had  been 
afraid  when  Vera  had  talked  to  her  about  Nicky  and 
Veronica;  and  when  she  had  seen  Veronica  and  Nicky 
playing  together  in  the  apple-tree  house;  and  when  she 
had  heard  Ronny's  voice  outside  the  schoolroom  door 
crying,  "  Where's  Nicky  ?  I  want  him.  Will  he  be  very 
long?" 

Supposing  Veronica  should  go  on  wanting  Nicky,  and 
supposing  Nicky  — 

Frances  was  so  worried  that,  when  Dorothy  came 
striding  across  the  lawn  to  ask  her  what  the  matter  was, 
and  what  on  earth  Grannie  and  the  Aunties  had  been 
gassing  about  all  that  time,  she  told  her. 

Dorothy  was  nineteen.  And  Dorothy  at  nineteen,  tall 
and  upright,  was  Anthony's  daughter.  Her  face  and  her 
whole  body  had  changed;  they  were  Anthony's  face  and 
body  made  feminine.  Her  little  straight  nose  had  now 
a  short  high  bridge;  her  brown  eyes  were  keen  and  alert; 
she  had  his  hawk's  look.  She  put  her  arm  in  Frances's, 
protecting  her,  and  they  walked  up  and  down  the  terrace 
path,  discussing  it.  In  the  distance  Grannie  and  the 
Aunties  could  be  seen  climbing  the  slope  of  the  Heath  to 
Judges'  Walk.  They  were  not,  Dorothy  protested,  pa- 
thetic; they  were  simply  beastly.  She  hated  them  for 
worrying  her  mother. 

"  They  think  I  oughtn't  to  have  taken  Ronny.  They 
think  Nicky'll  want  to  marry  her." 

"  But  Ronny's  a  kid  — " 

"  When  she's  not  a  kid," 


ioo  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  He  won't,  Mummy  ducky,  he  won't.  She'll  be  a  kid 
for  ages.  Nicky'll  have  married  somebody  else  before 
she's  got  her  hair  up." 

"  Then  Ronny'll  fall  in  love  with  him,  and  get  her 
little  heart  broken." 

"  She  won't,  Mummy,  she  won't.  They  only  talk  like 
that  because  they  think  Ferdie's  Ronny's  father." 

"Dorothy!" 

Frances,  in  horror,  released  herself  from  that  protect- 
ing arm.  The  horror  came,  not  from  the  fact,  but  from 
her  daughter's  knowledge  of  it. 

"  Poor  Mummy,  didn't  you  know  ?  That's  why  Bartie 
hates  her." 

"  It  isn't  true." 

"  What's  the  good  of  that  as  long  as  Bartie  thinks  it 
is  ?  "  said  Dorothy. 

"  '  London  Bridge  is  broken  down 
{Ride  over  my  Lady  Leighl)'" 

Veronica  was  in  the  drawing-room,  singing  "  London 
Bridge." 

Michael,  in  all  the  beauty  of  his  adolescence,  lay 
stretched  out  on  the  sofa,  watching  her.  Her  small,  ex- 
quisite, childish  face  between  the  plaits  of  honey-coloured 
hair,  her  small,  childish  face  thrilled  him  with  a  sin- 
gular delight  and  sadness.  She  was  so  young  and  so 
small,  and  at  the  same  time  so  perfect  that  Michael  could 
think  of  her  as  looking  like  that  for  ever,  not  growing  up 
into  a  tiresome,  bouncing,  fluffy  flapper  like  Rosalind 
Jervis. 

Aunt  Louie  and  Aunt  Emmeline  said  that  Rosalind 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  101 

was  in  love  with  him.     Michael  thought  that  was  beastly 
of  them  and  he  hoped  it  wasn't  true. 

"  '  Build  it  up  with  gold  so  fine  '  " — 

Veronica  was  happy ;  for  she  knew  herself  to  be  a  cause 
of  happiness.  Like  Frances  once,  she  was  profoundly 
aware  of  her  own  happiness,  and  for  the  same  reason. 
It  was,  if  you  came  to  think  of  it,  incredible.  It  had 
been  given  to  her,  suddenly,  when  she  was  not  looking 
for  it,  after  she  had  got  used  to  unhappiness. 

As  long  as  she  could  remember  Veronica  had  been 
aware  of  herself.  Aware  of  herself,  chiefly,  not  as  a  cause 
of  happiness,  but  as  a  cause  of  embarrassment  and  un- 
certainty and  trouble  to  three  people,  her  father,  her 
mother  and  Ferdie,  just  as  they  were  causes  of  embarrass- 
ment and  trouble  and  uncertainty  to  her.  They  lived  in 
a  sort  of  violent  mystery  that  she,  incomprehensibly,  was 
mixed  up  with.  As  long  as  she  could  remember,  her 
delicate,  childish  soul  had  quivered  with  the  vibration  of 
their  incomprehensible  and  tiresome  passions.  You  could 
never  tell  what  any  of  them  really  wanted,  though  among 
them  they  managed  to  create  an  atmosphere  of  most  dev- 
astating want.  Only  one  thing  she  knew  definitely  — 
that  they  didn't  want  her. 

She  was  altogether  out  of  it  except  as  a  meaningless 
counter  in  their  incomprehensible,  grown-up  game.  Her 
father  didn't  want  her;  her  mother  didn't  want  her  very 
much ;  and  though  now  and  then  Ferdie  (who  wasn't  any 
relation  at  all)  behaved  as  if  he  wanted  her,  his  wanting 
only  made  the  other  two  want  her  less  than  ever. 

There  had  been  no  peace  or  quietness  or  security  in  her 


102  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

little  life  of  eleven  years.  Their  places  (and  they  had 
had  so  many  of  them ! )  had  never  had  any  proper  place 
for  her.  She  seemed  to  have  spent  most  of  her  time  in 
being  turned  out  of  one  room  because  her  father  had  come 
into  it,  and  out  of  another  because  her  mother  wanted  to 
be  alone  in  it  with  Ferdie.  And  nobody,  except  Ferdie 
sometimes,  when  they  let  him,  ever  wanted  to  be  alone  in 
any  room  with  her.  She  was  so  tired  of  the  rooms  where 
she  was  obliged  to  be  always  alone  with  herself  or  with 
the  servants,  though  the  servants  were  always  kind. 

Now,  in  Uncle  Anthony's  house,  there  was  always  peace 
and  quietness  and  an  immense  security.  She  knew  that, 
having  taken  her,  they  wouldn't  give  her  up. 

She  was  utterly  happy. 

And  the  house,  with  its  long,  wainscoted  rooms,  its 
whiteness  and  darkness,  with  its  gay,  clean,  shining 
chintzes,  the  delicate,  faded  rose  stuffs,  the  deep  blue  and 
purple  and  green  stuffs,  and  the  blue  and  white  of  the  old 
china,  and  its  furniture  of  curious  woods,  the  golden,  the 
golden-brown,  the  black  and  the  wine-coloured,  bought  by 
Anthony  in  many  countries,  the  round  concave  mirrors, 
the  pictures  and  the  old  bronzes,  all  the  things  that  he 
had  gathered  together  and  laid  up  as  treasure  for  his 
sons ;  and  the  garden  on  the  promontory,  with  its  but- 
tressed walls  and  its  green  lawn,  its  flower  borders,  and 
its  tree  of  Heaven,  saturated  with  memories,  became  for 
her,  as  they  had  become  for  Frances,  the  sanctuary, 
crowded  with  visible  and  tangible  symbols,  of  the  Hap- 
piness she  adored. 

"  Sing  it  again,  Ronny." 

She  sang  it  again. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  103 

"  '  London  Bridge  is  broken  down  '  " — 

It  was  funny  of  Michael  to  like  the  silly,  childish 
song;  but  if  he  wanted  it  he  should  have  it.  Veronica 
would  have  given  any  of  them  anything  they  wanted. 
There  was  nothing  that  she  had  ever  wanted  that  they 
had  not  given  to  her. 

She  had  wanted  to  be  strong,  to  be  able  to  run  and 
ride,  to  play  tennis  and  cricket  and  hockey,  and  Nicky 
had  shown  her  how.  She  had  wanted  books  of  her  own, 
and  Auntie  Frances,  and  Uncle  Anthony  and  Dorothy 
and  Michael  had  given  her  books,  and  Nicky  had  made 
her  a  bookcase.  Her  room  (it  was  all  her  own)  was  full 
of  treasures.  She  had  wanted  to  learn  to  sing  and  play 
properly,  and  Uncle  Anthony  had  given  her  masters. 
She  had  wanted  people  to  love  her  music,  and  they  loved 
it.  She  had  wanted  a  big,  grown-up  sister  like  Dorothy, 
and  they  had  given  her  Dorothy;  and  she  had  wanted 
a  little  brother  of  her  own  age,  and  they  had  given 
her  John.  John  had  a  look  of  Nicky.  His  golden 
white  hair  was  light  brown  now;  his  fine,  wide 
mouth  had  Nicky's  impudence,  even  when,  like  Frances, 
he  kept  it  shut  to  smile  her  unwilling,  twitching, 
mocking  smile.  She  had  wanted  a  father  and  mother 
like  Frances  and  Anthony;  and  they  had  given  her  them- 
selves. 

And  she  had  wanted  to  live  in  the  same  house  with 
Nicky  always. 

So  if  Michael  wanted  her  to  sing  "  London  Bridge  "  to 
him  twenty  times  over,  she  would  sing  it,  provided  Nicky 
didn't  ask  her  to  do  anything  else  at  the  same  time.  For 
she  wanted  to  do  most  for  Nicky,  always. 


104  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN. 

And  yet  she  was  aware  of  something  else  that  was  not 
happiness.  It  was  not  a  thing  you  could  name  or  under- 
stand, or  seize,  or  see;  you  were  simply  aware  of  it,  as 
you  were  aware  of  ghosts  in  your  room  at  night.  Like 
the  ghosts,  it  was  not  always  there ;  but  when  it  was  there 
you  knew. 

It  felt  sometimes  as  if  Auntie  Frances  was  afraid  of 
her ;  as  if  she,  Veronica,  was  a  ghost. 

And  Veronica  said  to  herself,  "  She  is  afraid  I  am  not 
good.     She  thinks  I'll  worry  her.     But  I  shan't." 

That  was  before  the  holidays.  Now  that  they  had  come 
and  Nicky  was  back,  "  it "  seemed  to  her  something  to  do 
with  Nicky ;  and  Veronica  said  to  herself,  "  She  is  afraid 
I'll  get  in  his  way  and  worry  him,  because  he's  older. 
But  I  shan't." 

As  if  she  had  not  been  taught  and  trained  not  to  get  in 
older  people's  ways  and  worry  them.  And  as  if  she  wasn't 
growing  older  every  minute  herself ! 

"  '  Build  it  up  with  gold  so  fine  — 

(Ride  over  my  Lady  Leigh!) 

"  '  Build  it  up  with  stones  so  strong '  " — 

She  had  her  back  to  the  door  and  to  the  mirror  that  re- 
flected it,  yet  she  knew  that  Nicky  had  come  in. 

"  That's  the  song  you  used  to  sing  at  bed-time  when  you 
were  frightened,"  he  said. 


She  was  sitting  now  in  the  old  hen-house  that  was 
Nicky's   workshop,   watching  him   as   he   turned   square 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  105 

bars  of  brass  into  round  bars  with  his  lathe.  She  had 
plates  of  steel  to  polish,  and  pieces  of  wood  to  rub  smooth 
with  glass-paper.  There  were  sheets  of  brass  and  cop- 
per, and  bars  and  lumps  of  steel,  and  great  poles  and 
planks  of  timber  reared  up  round  the  walls  of  the  work- 
shop. The  metal  filings  fell  from  Nicky's  lathe  into 
sawdust  that  smelt  deliciously. 

The  workshop  was  nicer  than  the  old  apple-tree  house, 
because  there  were  always  lots  of  things  to  do  in  it  for 
Nicky. 

"  Nicky,"  she  said  suddenly,  "  do  you  believe  in 
ghosts  ?  " 

"  Well  — "  Nicky  caught  his  bar  as  it  fell  from  the 
lathe  and  examined  it  critically. 

"  You  remember  when  I  was  afraid  of  ghosts,  and  you 
used  to  come  and  sit  with  me  till  I  went  to  sleep  ?  " 

"  Rather." 

"  Well  —  there  are  ghosts.  I  saw  one  last  night.  It 
came  into  the  room  just  after  I  got  into  bed." 

"  You  can  see  them,"  Nicky  said.  "  Ferdie's  seen 
heaps.     It  runs  in  his  family.     He  told  me." 

"  He  never  told  me." 

"  Rather  not.     He  was  afraid  you'd  be  frightened." 

"Well,  I  wasn't  frightened.  Not  the  least  little 
bit." 

"  I  shall  tell  him  that.  He  wanted  most  awfully  to 
know  whether  you  saw  them  too." 

"  Me  ?  But  Nicky  —  it  was  Ferdie  I  saw.  He  stood 
by  the  door  and  looked  at  me.     Like  he  does,  you  know." 

The  next  morning  Frances  had  a  letter  of  two  lines 
from  Veronica's  mother : 


106  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Ferdie  died  last  evening  at  half  past  eight. 
"  He  wants  you  to  keep  Ronny. 

"  Vera." 

It  was  not  till  years  later  that  Veronica  knew  that 
"  He  wanted  most  awfully  to  know  whether  you  saw  them 
too  "  meant  "  He  wanted  most  awfully  to  know  whether 
you  really  were  his  daughter." 


PART  II 
TEE  VORTEX 


XI 

Three  years  passed.  It  was  the  autumn  of  nineteen- 
ten.  Anthony's  house. was  empty  for  the  time  being  of 
all  its  children  except  Dorothea. 

Michael  was  in  the  beginning  of  his  last  year  at  Cam- 
bridge. Nicholas  was  in  his  second  year.  He  had  taken 
up  mathematics  and  theoretical  mechanics.  In  the  long 
vacation,  when  the  others  went  into  the  country,  he  stayed 
behind  to  work  in  the  engineering  sheds  of  the  Morss 
Motor  Company.  John  was  at  Cheltenham.  Veronica 
was  in  Dresden. 

Dorothea  had  left  Newnham  a  year  ago,  having  taken 
a  first-class  in  Economics. 

As  Anthony  came  home  early  one  evening  in  October, 
he  found  a  group  of  six  strange  women  in  the  lane,  wait- 
ing outside  his  garden  door  in  attitudes  of  conspiracy. 

Four  of  them,  older  women,  stood  together  in  a  close 
ring.  The  two  others,  young  girls,  hung  about  near,  but 
a  little  apart  from  the  ring,  as  if  they  desired  not  to 
identify  themselves  with  any  state  of  mind  outside  their 
own.  By  their  low  sibilant  voices,  the  daring  sidelong 
sortie  of  their  bright  eyes,  their  gestures,  furtive  and 
irrepressible,  you  gathered  that  there  was  unanimity  on 
one  point.  All  six  considered  themselves  to  have  been 
discovered. 

At  Anthony's  approach  they  moved  away,  with  slow, 
casual  steps,  passed  through  the  posts  at  the  bottom  of 
the  lane  and  plunged  down  the  steep  path,  as  if  under  the 

109 


no  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

impression  that  the  nature  of  the  ground  covered  their 
retreat.  They  bobbed  up  again,  one  after  the  other,  when 
the  lane  was  clear. 

The  first  to  appear  was  a  tall,  handsome,  bad-tempered- 
looking  girl.     She  spoke  first. 

"  It's  a  damned  shame  of  them  to  keep  us  waiting  like 
this." 

She  propped  herself  up  against  Anthony's  wall  and 
smouldered  there  in  her  dark,  sullen  beauty. 

"  We  were  here  at  six  sharp." 

"  When  they  know  we  were  told  not  to  let  on  where 
we  meet." 

"  We're  led  into  a  trap,"  said  a  grey-haired  woman. 

"  I  say,  who  is  Dorothea  Harrison  ?  " 

"  She's  the  girl  who  roped  Rosalind  in.  She's  all 
right." 

"  Yes,  but  are  her  people  all  right  %  " 

"  Rosalind  knows  them." 

The  grey-haired  woman  spoke  again. 

"  Well,  if  you  think  this  lane  is  a  good  place  for  a 
secret  meeting,  2"  don't.  Are  you  aware  that  the  yard  of 
'  Jack  Straw's  Castle  '  is  behind  that  wall  ?  What's  to  pre- 
vent them  bringing  up  five  or  six  coppers  and  planting 
them  there  ?  Why,  they've  only  got  to  post  one  'tec  at  the 
top  of  the  lane,  and  another  at  the  bottom,  and  we're  done. 
Trapped.     I  call  it  rotten." 

"  It's  all  right.     Here  they  are." 

Dorothea  Harrison  and  Rosalind  Jcrvis  came  down 
the  lane  at  a  leisured  stride,  their  long  coats  buttoned  up 
to  their  chins  and  their  hands  in  their  pockets.  Their 
gestures  were  devoid  of  secrecy  or  any  guile.     Each  had  a 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  m 

joyous  air  of  being  in  command,  of  being-  able  to  hold  up 
the  whole  adventure  at  her  will,  or  let  it  rip. 

Rosalind  Jervis  was  no  longer  a  bouncing,  fluffy  flap- 
per. In  three  years  she  had  shot  up  into  the  stature  of 
command.  She  slouched,  stooping  a  little  from  the  shoul- 
ders, and  carried  her  pink  face  thrust  forward,  as  if  lean- 
ing from  a  platform  to  address  an  audience.  From  this 
salience  her  small  chin  retreated  delicately  into  her  pink 
throat. 

"  Is  Miss  Maud  Blackadder  here  ? "  she  said,  mar- 
shalling her  six. 

The  handsome  girl  detached  herself  slowly  from  An- 
thony's wall. 

"  What's  the  point,"  she  said,  "  of  keeping  us  hanging 
about  like  this  — " 

"  Till  all  our  faces  are  known  to  the  police  — " 

"  There's  a  Johnnie  gone  in  there  who  can  swear  to  me. 
Why  didn't  you  two  turn  up  before  ?  "  said  the  handsome 
girl. 

"  Because,"  said  Dorothea,  "  that  Johnnie  was  my 
father.  He  was  pounding  on  in  front  of  us  all  up  East 
Heath  Road.  If  we'd  got  here  sooner  I  should  have  had 
to  introduce  you." 

She  looked  at  the  six  benevolently,  indulgently.  They 
might  have  been  children  whose  behaviour  amused  her. 
It  was  as  if  she  had  said,  "  I  avoided  that  introduction, 
not  because  it  would  have  been  dangerous  and  indiscreet, 
but  because  it  would  have  spoiled  your  fun  for  you." 

She  led  the  way  into  the  garden  and  the  house  and 
through  the  hall  into  the  schoolroom.  There  they  found 
eleven  young  girls  who  had  come  much  too  soon,  and  mis- 


ii2  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

taking  the  arrangements,  had  rung  the  bell  and  allowed 
themselves  to  be  shown  in. 

The  schoolroom  had  been  transformed  into  a  sort  of 
meeting  hall.  The  big  oblong  table  had  been  drawn  across 
one  end  of  it.  Behind  it  were  chairs  for  the  speakers, 
before  it  were  three  rows  of  chairs  where  the  eleven  young 
girls  sat  scattered,  expectant. 

The  six  stood  in  the  free  space  in  front  of  the  table  and 
looked  at  Rosalind  with  significance. 

"  This,"  said  Rosalind,  "  is  our  hostess,  Miss  Dorothea 
Harrison.  Dorothy,  I  think  you've  met  Mrs.  Eden,  our 
Treasurer.  This  is  our  secretary,  Miss  Valentina  Gil- 
christ ;  Miss  Ethel  Farmer ;  Miss  Winifred  Burstall  — " 

Dorothy  greeted  in  turn  Mrs.  Eden,  a  pretty,  gentle 
woman  with  a  face  of  dreaming  tragedy  (it  was  she  who 
had  defended  Rosalind  outside  the  gate)  ;  Miss  Valen- 
tina Gilchrist,  a  middle-aged  woman  who  displayed  a 
large  grey  pompadour  above  a  rosy  face  with  turned- 
back  features  which,  when  she  was  not  excited,  had  an 
incredulous  quizzical  expression  (Miss  Gilchrist  was  the 
one  who  had  said  they  had  been  led  into  a  trap) ;  Miss 
Ethel  Farmer,  fair,  attenuated,  scholastic,  wearing  pince- 
nez  with  an  air  of  not  seeing  you;  and  Miss  Winifred 
Burstall,  weather-beaten,  young  at  fifty,  wearing  pince- 
nez  with  an  air  of  seeing  straight  through  you  to  the 
other  side. 

Rosalind  went  on.     "  Miss  Maud  Blackadder  — " 

Miss  Blackadder's  curt  bow  accused  Rosalind  of  wast- 
ing time  in  meaningless  formalities. 

"  Miss  — "     Rosalind  was  at  a  loss. 

The  other  girl,  the  youngest  of  the  eight,  came  forward, 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  113 

holding  out  a  slender,  sallow-white  hand.  She  was  the 
one  who  had  hung  with  Miss  Blackadder  in  the  back- 
ground. 

"  Desmond,"  she  said.     "  Phyllis  Desmond." 

She  shrugged  her  pretty  shoulders  and  smiled  slightly, 
as  much  as  to  say,  "  She  forgets  what  she  ought  to  re- 
member, but  it  doesn't  matter." 

Phyllis  Desmond  was  beautiful.  But  for  the  moment 
her  beauty  was  asleep,  stilled  into  hardness.  Dorothy 
saw  a  long,  slender,  sallow-white  face,  between  sleek  bands 
of  black  hair;  black  eyes,  dulled  as  if  by  a  subtle  film, 
like  breath  on  a  black  looking-glass ;  a  beautiful  slender 
mouth,  pressed  tight,  holding  back  the  secret  of  its  sensual 
charm. 

Dorothy  thought  she  had  seen  her  before,  but  she 
couldn't  remember  where. 

Eosalind  Jervis  looked  at  her  watch  with  a  business- 
like air;  paper  and  pencils  were  produced;  coats  were 
thrown  on  the  little  school-desks  and  benches  in  the  corner 
where  Dorothy  and  her  brothers  had  sat  at  their  lessons 
with  Mr.  Parsons  some  twelve  years  ago;  and  the  eight 
gathered  about  the  big  table,  Rosalind  taking  the  presi- 
dential chair  (which  had  once  been  Mr.  Parsons'  chair) 
in  the  centre  between  Miss  Gilchrist  and  Miss  Black- 
adder. 

Miss  Burstall  and  Miss  Farmer  looked  at  each  other 
and  Miss  Burstall  spoke. 

"  We  understood  that  this  was  to  be  an  informal  meet- 
ing. Before  we  begin  business  I  should  like  to  ask  one 
question.  I  should  like  to  know  what  we  are  and  what 
we  are  here  for  ?  " 


ii4  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  We,  Mrs.  Eden,  Miss  Valentina  Gilchrist,  Miss  Maud 
Blackadder  and  myself,"  said  Rosalind  in  the  tone  of  one 
dealing  reasonably  with  an  unreasonable  person,  "  are  the 
Committee  of  the  North  Hampstead  Branch  of  the 
Women's  Franchise  Union.  Miss  Gilchrist  is  our  secre- 
tary, I  am  the  President  and  Miss  Blackadder  is  —  er  — 
the  Committee." 

"By  whom  elected?  This,"  said  Miss  Burstall,  "is 
most  irregular." 

Rosalind  went  on:  "We  are  here  to  appoint  a  vice- 
president,  to  elect  members  of  the  Committee  and  enlist 
subscribers  to  the  Union.     These  things  will  take  time." 

"  We  were  punctual,"  said  Miss  Farmer. 

Bosalind  did  not  even  look  at  her.  The  moment  had 
come  to  address  the  meeting. 

"  I  take  it  that  we  are  all  agreed  as  to  the  main  issue, 
that  we  have  not  come  here  to  convert  each  other,  that  we 
all  want  Women's  Franchise,  that  we  all  mean  to  have  it, 
that  we  are  all  prepared  to  work  for  it,  and,  if  necessary, 
to  fight  for  it,  to  oppose  the  Government  that  withholds 
it  by  every  means  in  our  power  — " 

"  By  every  constitutional  menns,"  Miss  Burstall 
amended,  and  was  told  by  Miss  Gilchrist  that,  if  she  de- 
sired proceedings  to  be  regular,  she  must  not  interrupt  the 
Chairwoman. 

" —  To  oppose  the  Government  that  refuses  us  the  vote, 
whatever  Government  it  may  be,  regardless  of  party,  by 
every  means  in  our  power." 

Rosalind's  sentences  were  punctuated  by  a  rhythmic 
sound  of  tapping.  Miss  Maud  Blackadder,  twisted  side- 
ways on  the  chair  she  had  pushed  farther  and  farther  back 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  115 

from  the  table,  so  as  to  bring  herself  completely  out  of  line 
with  the  other  seven,  from  time  to  time,  rhythmically, 
twitching  with  impatience,  struck  her  own  leg  with  her 
own  walking-stick. 

Rosalind  perorated.  "  If  we  differ,  we  differ,  not  as 
to  our  end,  but  solely  as  to  the  means  we,  personally  and 
individually,  are  prepared  to  employ."  She  looked  round. 
"  Agreed." 

"  Not  agreed,"  said  Dorothy  and  Miss  Burstall  and 
Miss  Farmer  all  at  once. 

"  I  will  now  call  on  Miss  Maud  Blackadder  to  speak. 
She  will  explain  to  those  of  you  who  are  strangers  "  (she 
glanced  comprehensively  at  the  eleven  young  girls)  "  the 
present  program  of  the  Union." 

"  I  protest,"  said  Miss  Burstall.  "  There  has  been 
confusion." 

"  There  really  has,  Rosalind,"  said  Dorothy.  "  You 
must  get  it  straight.  You  can't  start  all  at  sixes  and 
sevens.     I  protest  too." 

"  We  all  three  protest,"  said  Miss  Farmer,  frowning 
and  blinking  in  an  agony  of  protest. 

"  Silence,  if  you  please,  for  the  Chairwoman,"  said 
Miss  Gilchrist. 

"  May  we  not  say  one  word  ?  " 

"  You  may,"  said  Rosalind,  "  in  your  turn.  I  now 
call  on  Miss  Blackadder  to  speak." 

At  the  sound  of  her  own  name  Miss  Blackadder  jumped 
to  her  feet.  The  walking-stick  fell  to  the  floor  with  a 
light  clatter  and  crash,  preluding  her  storm.  She  jerked 
out  her  words  at  a  headlong  pace,  as  if  to  make  up  for  the 
time  the  others  had  wasted  in  futilities. 


n6  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  I  am  not  going  to  say  much,  I  am  not  going  to  take 
up  your  time.  Too  much  time  has  been  lost  already.  I 
am  not  a  speaker,  I  am  not  a  writer,  I  am  not  an  intel- 
lectual woman,  and  if  you  ask  me  what  I  am  and  what  I 
am  here  for,  and  what  I  am  doing  in  the  Union,  and  what 
the  Union  is  doing  with  me,  and  what  possible  use  I,  an 
untrained  girl,  can  be  to  you  clever  women  "  (she  looked 
tempestuously  at  Miss  Burstall  and  Miss  Farmer  who  did 
not  flinch),  "  I  will  tell  you.  I  am  a  fighter.  I  am  here 
to  enlist  volunteers.  I  am  the  recruiting  sergeant  for  this 
district.  That  is  the  use  my  leaders,  who  should  be 
your  leaders,  are  making  of  me." 

Her  head  was  thrown  back,  her  body  swayed,  rocked 
from  side  to  side  with  the  violent  rhythm  of  her  speech. 

"  If  you  ask  me  why  they  have  chosen  me  I  will  tell 
you.  It's  because  I  know  what  I  want  and  because  I 
know  how  to  get  what  I  want. 

"  I  know  what  I  want.  Oh,  yes,  you  think  that's  noth- 
ing ;  you  all  think  you  know  what  you  want.  But  do  you  ? 
Do  you  ?  " 

"  Of  course  we  do !  " 

"  We  want  the  vote !  " 

"  Nothing  but  the  vote !  " 

"Nothing  but?  Are  you  quite  sure  of  that?  Can 
you  even  say  you  want  it  till  you  know  whether  there  are 
things  you  want  more  ?  " 

"  What  are  you  driving  at  ?  " 

"  You'll  soon  see  what  I'm  driving  at.  I  drive  straight. 
And  I  ride  straight.     And  I  don't  funk  my  fences. 

"  Well  —  say  you  all  want  the  vote.  Do  you  know  how 
much  you  want  it  ?     Do  you  know  how  much  you  want  to 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  117 

pay  for  it?  Do  you  know  what  you're  prepared  to  give 
up  for  it  ?  Because,  if  you  don't  know  that,  you  don't 
know  how  much  you  want  it." 

"  We  want  it  as  much  as  you  do,  I  imagine." 

"  You  want  it  as  much  as  I  do  ?  Good.  Then  you're 
going  to  pay  the  price  whatever  the  price  is.  Then  you're 
ready  to  give  up  everything  else,  your  homes  and  your 
families  and  your  friends  and  your  incomes.  Until  you're 
enfranchised  you  are  not  going  to  own  any  man  as  father, 
or  brother  or  husband  "  (her  voice  rang  with  a  deeper  and 
stronger  vibration)  "  or  lover,  or  friend.  And  the  man 
who  does  not  agree  with  you,  the  man  who  refuses  you  the 
vote,  the  man  who  opposes  your  efforts  to  get  the  vote,  the 
man  who,  whether  he  agrees  with  you  or  not,  will  not 
help  you  to  get  it,  you  count  as  your  enemy.  That  is 
wanting  the  vote.     That  is  wanting  it  as  much  as  I  do. 

"  You  women  —  are  you  prepared  to  go  against  your 
men  ?     To  give  up  your  men  ?  " 

There  were  cries  of  "  Rather !  "  from  two  of  the  eleven 
young  girls  who  had  come  too  soon. 

Miss  Burstall  shook  her  head  and  murmured,  "  Hope- 
less confusion  of  thought.  If  this  is  what  it's  going  to  be 
like,  Heaven  help  us !  " 

"  You  really  are  getting  a  bit  mixed,"  said  Dorothy. 

"  We  protest  — " 

"  Protest  then ;  protest  as  much  as  you  like.  Then  we 
shall  know  where  we  are ;  then  we  shall  get  things  straight ; 
then  we  can  begin.  You  all  want  the  vote.  Some  of  you 
don't  know  how  much,  but  at  least  you  know  you  want  it. 
Nobody's  confused  about  that.  Do  you  know  how  you're 
going  to  get  it?     Tell  me  that." 


n8  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Lest  they  should  spoil  it  all  by  telling  her  Miss  Black- 
adder  increased  her  vehement  pace.  "  You  don't  because 
you  can't  and  I  will  tell  you.  You  won't  get  it  by  talking 
about  it  or  by  writing  about  it,  or  by  sitting  down  and 
thinking  about  it,  you'll  get  it  by  coming  in  with  me, 
coming  in  with  the  Women's  Franchise  Union,  and  fight- 
ing for  it.  Fighting  women,  not  talkers  —  not  writers  — 
not  thinkers  are  what  we  want !  "  She  sat  down,  heaving 
a  little  with  the  ground-swell  of  her  storm,  amid  applause 
in  which  only  Miss  Burstall  and  Miss  Farmer  did  not 
join.     She  was  now  looking  extraordinarily  handsome. 

Rosalind  bent  over  and  whispered  something  in  her 
ear.  She  rose  to  her  feet  again,  flushed,  smiling  at  them, 
triumphant. 

"  Our  Chairwoman  has  reminded  me  that  I  came  here 
to  tell  you  what  the  program  of  our  Union  is.  And  I 
can  tell  you  in  six  words.  It's  Hell-for-leather,  and  it's 
Neck-or-nothing !  " 

"  Now,"  said  Rosalind  sweetly,  bowing  towards  Miss 
Burstall,  "  it's  your  turn.  We  should  like  to  know  what 
you  have  to  say." 

Miss  Burstall  did  not  rise  and  in  the  end  Dorothea 
spoke. 

"  My  friend,  Miss  Rosalind  Jervis,  assumed  that  we 
were  all  agreed,  not  only  as  to  our  aims,  but  as  to  our 
policy.  She  has  not  yet  discriminated  between  constitu- 
tional and  unconstitutional  means.  When  we  protested, 
she  quashed  our  protest.  We  took  exception  to  the 
phrase  '  every  means  in  our  power,'  because  that  would 
commit  us  to  all  sorts  of  unconstitutional  things.  It  is 
in  my  power  to  squirt  water  into  the  back  of  the  Prime 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  119 

Minister's  neck,  or  to  land  a  bomb  in  the  small  of  his 
back,  or  in  the  centre  of  the  platform  at  his  next  public 
meeting.  We  were  left  to  conclude  that  the  only  differ- 
ences between  us  would  concern  our  choice  of  the  squirt 
or  the  bomb.  As  some  of  us  here  might  equally  object  to 
using  the  bomb  or  the  squirt,  I  submit  that  either  our 
protest  should  have  been  allowed  or  our  agreement  should 
not  have  been  taken  for  granted  at  the  start. 

"  Again,  Miss  Maud  Blackadder,  in  her  sporting  speech, 
her  heroic  speech,  has  not  cleared  the  question.  She  has 
appealed  to  us  to  come  in,  without  counting  the  cost;  but 
she  has  said  nothing  to  convince  us  that  when  our  account 
at  our  bank  is  overdrawn,  and  we  have  declared  war  on 
all  our  male  friends  and  relations,  and  have  left  our  com- 
fortable homes,  and  are  all  camping  out  on  the  open 
Heath  —  I  repeat,  she  has  said  nothing  to  convince  us  that 
the  price  we  shall  have  paid  is  going  to  get  us  the  thing  we 
want. 

"  She  says  that  fighters  are  wanted,  and  not  talkers  and 
writers  and  thinkers.  Are  we  not  then  to  fight  with  our 
tongues  and  with  our  brains  ?  Is  she  leaving  us  anything 
but  our  bare  fists  ?  She  has  told  us  that  she  rides  straight 
and  that  she  doesn't  funk  her  fences ;  but  she  has  not  told 
us  what  sort  of  country  she  is  going  to  ride  over,  nor  where 
the  fences  are,  not  what  Hell-for-leather  and  Neck-or- 
nothing  means. 

"We  want  meaning;  we  want  clearness  and  precision. 
We  have  not  been  given  it  yet. 

"  I  would  let  all  this  pass  if  Miss  Blackadder  were  not 
your  colour-sergeant.  Is  it  fair  to  call  for  volunteers, 
for  raw  recruits,  and  not  tell  them  precisely  and  clearly 


120  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

what  services  will  be  required  of  them  ?  How  many " 
(Dorothy  glanced  at  the  eleven)  "  realize  that  the  leaders 
of  your  Union,  Mrs.  Pahnerston-Swete,  and  Mrs.  Blath- 
waite,  and  Miss  Angela  Blathwaite,  demand  from  its  mem- 
bers blind,  unquestioning  obedience  ?  " 

Maud  Blackadder  jumped  up. 

"  I  protest.  I,  too,  have  the  right  to  protest.  Miss 
Harrison  calls  me  to  order.  She  tells  me  to  be  clear  and 
precise.  Will  she  be  good  enough  to  be  clear  and  precise 
herself?  Will  she  say  whether  she  is  with  us  or  against 
us  ?  If  she  is  not  with  us  she  is  against  us.  Let  her  ex- 
plain her  position." 

She  sat  down;  and  Rosalind  rose. 

"  Miss  Harrison,"  she  said,  "  will  explain  her  position 
to  the  Committee  later.  This  is  an  open  meeting  till 
seven.  It  is  now  five  minutes  to.  Will  any  of  you 
here  " —  she  held  the  eleven  with  her  eyes  — "  who  were 
not  present  at  the  meeting  in  the  Town  Hall  last  Monday, 
hold  up  your  hands.  No  hands.  Then  you  must  all  be 
aware  of  the  object  and  the  policy  and  the  rules  of  the 
Women's  Franchise  Union.  Its  members  pledge  them- 
selves to  help,  as  far  as  they  can,  the  object  of  the  Union; 
to  support  the  decisions  of  their  leaders ;  to  abstain  from 
public  and  private  criticism  of  those  decisions  and  of  any 
words  or  actions  of  their  leaders ;  and  to  obey  orders  —  not 
blindly  or  unquestioningly,  but  within  the  terms  of  their 
undertakings. 

"  Those  of  you  who  wish  to  join  us  will  please  write 
your  names  and  addresses  on  the  slips  of  white  paper,  stat- 
ing what  kind  of  work  you  are  willing  to  do  and  the 
amount  of  your  subscription,  if  you  subscribe,  and  hand 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  121 

your  slips  to  the  Secretary  at  the  door,  as  you  go  out." 

Miss  Burstall  and  Miss  Farmer  went  out.  Miss  Black- 
adder  counted  — "  One  —  two  — " 

Eight  of  the  eleven  young  girls  signed  and  handed  in 
the  white  slips  at  the  door,  and  went  out. 

"  Three  —  four  — " 

Miss  Blackadder  reckoned  that  Dorothea  Harrison's 
speech  had  cost  her  five  recruits.  Her  own  fighting  speech 
had  carried  the  eleven  in  a  compact  body  to  her  side: 
Dorothea's  speech  had  divided  and  scattered  them  again. 

Miss  Blackadder  hurled  her  personality  at  the  heads  of 
audiences  in  the  certainty  that  it  would  hit  them  hard. 
That  was  what  she  was  there  for.  She  knew  that  the 
Women's  Franchise  Union  relied  on  her  to  wring  from  her- 
self the  utmost  spectacular  effect.  And  she  did  it  every 
time.  She  never  once  missed  fire.  And  Dorothea  Har- 
rison had  come  down  on  the  top  of  her  triumph  and  de- 
stroyed the  effect  of  all  her  fire.  She  had  corrupted  five 
recruits.  And,  supposing  there  was  a  secret  program, 
she  had  betrayed  the  women  of  the  Union  to  fourteen  out- 
siders, by  giving  it  away.  Treachery  or  no  treachery, 
Dorothea  Harrison  would  have  to  pay  for  it. 

Everybody  had  gone  except  the  members  of  the  Com- 
mittee and  Phyllis  Desmond  who  waited  for  her  friend, 
Maud  Blackadder. 

Dorothy  remembered  Phyllis  Desmond  now;  she  was 
that  art-student  girl  that  Vera  knew.  She  had  seen  her 
at  Vera's  house. 

They  had  drawn  round  the  table  again.  Miss  Black- 
adder  and  Miss  Gilchrist  conferred  in  whispers. 


122  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Before  we  go,"  said  Rosalind,  "  I  propose  that  we  ask 
Miss  Dorothea  Harrison  to  be  our  Vice-President." 

Miss  Gilchrist  nodded  to  Miss  Blackadder  who  rose. 
It  was  her  moment. 

"  And  /  propose,"  she  said,  "  that  before  we  invite  Miss 
Harrison  to  be  anything  we  ask  her  to  define  her  position 
—  clearly  and  precisely." 

She  made  a  sign,  and  the  Secretary  was  on  her  feet. 

"And  first  we  must  ask  Miss  Harrison  to  explain  how 
she  became  possessed  of  the  secret  policy  of  the  Union 
which  has  never  been  discussed  at  any  open  meeting  and 
is  unknown  to  members  of  the  General  Committee." 

"  Then,"  said  Dorothy,  "  there  is  a  secret  policy  ?  " 

"  You  seem  to  know  it.  We  have  the  right  to  ask  how 
you  know?     Unless  you  invented  it." 

Dorothy  faced  them.  It  was  inconceivable  that  it 
should  have  happened,  that  she  should  be  standing  there, 
in  the  old  schoolroom  of  her  father's  house,  while  two 
strange  women  worried  her.  She  knew  that  her  back  was 
to  the  wall  and  that  the  Blackadder  girl  had  been  on  the 
watch  for  the  last  half-hour  to  get  her  knife  into  her. 
(Odd,  for  she  had  admired  the  Blackadder  girl  and  her 
fighting  gestures.)  It  was  inconceivable  that  she  should 
have  to  answer  to  that  absurd  committee  for  her  honour. 
It  was  inconceivable  that  Rosalind,  her  friend,  should  not 
help  her. 

Yet  it  had  happened.  With  all  her  platform  eloquence 
Rosalind  couldn't,  for  the  life  of  her,  get  out  one  heroic, 
defending  word.  From  the  moment  when  the  Gilchrist 
woman  had  pounced,  Rosalind  had  simply  sat  and  stared, 
like  a  rabbit,  like  a  fish,  her  mouth  open  for  the  word 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  123 

that  would  not  come.  Rosalind  was  afraid  to  stand  up 
for  her.  It  was  dreadful,  and  it  was  funny  to  see  Rosa- 
lind looking  like  that,  and  to  realize  the  extent  of  her 
weakness  and  her  obstinacy. 

Yet  Rosalind  had  not  changed.  She  was  still  the 
school-girl  slacker  who  could  never  do  a  stroke  of  work 
until  somebody  had  pushed  her  into  it,  who  could  never 
leave  off  working  until  stopped  by  the  same  hand  that  had 
set  her  going.  Her  power  to  go,  and  to  let  herself  rip, 
and  the  weakness  that  made  her  depend  on  Dorothy  to 
start  her  were  the  qualities  that  attracted  Dorothy  to 
Rosalind  from  the  beginning.  But  now  she  was  the  tool 
of  the  fighting  Suffrage  Women.  Or  if  she  wasn't  a  tool, 
she  was  a  machine;  her  brain  was  a  rapid,  docile,  me- 
chanical apparatus  for  turning  out  bad  imitations  of  Mrs. 
Palmerston-Swete  and  the  two  Blathwaites.  Her  air  of 
casual  command,  half-swagger,  half-slouch,  her  stoop  and 
the  thrusting  forward  of  her  face,  were  copied  sedulously 
from  an  admired  model. 

Dorothy  found  her  pitiable.  She  was  hypnotized  by  the 
Blathwaites  who  worked  her  and  would  throw  her  away 
when  she  was  of  no  more  use.  She  hadn't  the  strength  to 
resist  the  pull  and  the  grip  and  the  drive  of  other  people. 
She  couldn't  even  hold  out  against  Valentina  Gilchrist 
and  Maud  Blackadder.  Rosalind  would  always  be  caught 
and  spun  round  by  any  movement  that  was  strong  enough. 
She  was  foredoomed  to  the  Vortex. 

That  was  Dorothy's  fault.  It  was  she  who  had  pushed 
and  pulled  the  slacker,  in  spite  of  her  almost  whining  pro- 
test, to  the  edge  of  the  Vortex;  and  it  was  Rosalind,  not 
Dorothy,  who  had  been  caught  and  sucked  down  into  the 


124  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

swirl.  She  whirled  in  it  now,  and  would  go  on  whirling, 
under  the  impression  that  her  movements  made  it  move. 

The  Vortex  fascinated  Dorothy  even  while  she  resisted 
it.  She  liked  the  feeling  of  her  own  power  to  resist,  to 
keep  her  head,  to  beat  up  against  the  rush  of  the  whirl- 
wind, to  wheel  round  and  round  outside  it,  and  swerve 
away  before  the  thing  got  her. 

For  Dorothy  was  afraid  of  the  Feminist  Vortex,  as  her 
brother  Michael  had  been  afraid  of  the  little  vortex  of 
school.  She  was  afraid  of  the  herded  women.  She  dis- 
liked the  excited  faces,  and  the  high  voices  skirling  their 
battle-cries,  and  the  silly  business  of  committees,  and  the 
platform  slang.  She  was  sick  and  shy  before  the  tremor 
and  the  surge  of  collective  feeling;  she  loathed  the  ges- 
tures and  the  movements  of  the  collective  soul,  the  sway- 
ing and  heaving  and  rushing  forward  of  the  many  as  one. 
She  would  not  be  carried  away  by  it ;  she  would  keep  the 
clearness  and  hardness  of  her  soul.  It  was  her  soul  they 
wanted,  these  women  of  the  Union,  the  Blathwaites  and 
the  Palmerston-Swetes,  and  Rosalind,  and  the  Blackadder 
girl  and  the  Gilchrist  woman;  they  ran  out  after  her  like 
a  hungry  pack  yelping  for  her  soul ;  and  she  was  not  going 
to  throw  it  to  them.  She  would  fight  for  freedom,  but 
not  in  their  way  and  not  at  their  bidding. 

She  was  her  brother  Michael,  refusing  to  go  to  the 
party;  refusing  to  run  with  the  school  herd,  holding  out 
for  his  private  soul  against  other  people  who  kept  him 
from  remembering.  Only  Michael  did  not  hold  out.  He 
ran  away.  She  would  stay,  on  the  edge  of  the  vortex, 
fascinated  by  its  danger,  and  resisting. 

But  as  she  looked  at  them,  at  Rosalind  with  her  open 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  125 

mouth,  at  the  Blackadder  girl  who  was  scowling  horribly, 
and  at  Valentina  Gilchrist,  sceptical  and  quizzical,  she 
laughed.  The  three  had  been  trying  to  rush  her,  and 
because  they  couldn't  rush  her  they  were  questioning  her 
honour.  She  had  asked  them  plainly  for  a  plain  meaning, 
and  their  idea  of  apt  repartee  was  to  pretend  to  question 
her  honour. 

Perhaps  they  really  did  question  it.  She  didn't  care. 
She  loathed  their  excited,  silly,  hurrying  suspicion;  but 
she  didn't  care.  It  was  she  who  had  drawn  them  and  led 
them  on  to  this  display  of  incomparable  idiocy.  Like 
her  brother  Nicholas  she  found  that  adversity  was  ex- 
tremely funny ;  and  she  laughed. 

She  was  no  longer  Michael,  she  was  Nicky,  not  caring, 
delighting  in  her  power  to  fool  them. 

"  You  think,"  she  said,  "  I'd  no  business  to  find  out  %  " 

"  Your  knowledge  would  certainly  have  been  myste- 
rious," said  the  Secretary ;  "  unless  at  least  two  confidences 
had  been  betrayed.  Supposing  there  had  been  any  secret 
policy." 

"  Well,  you  see,  I  don't  know  it ;  and  I  didn't  invent  it ; 
and  I  didn't  find  it  out  —  precisely.  Your  secret  policy 
is  the  logical  conclusion  of  your  present  policy.  I  de- 
duced it;  that's  all.  Anybody  could  have  done  the  same. 
Does  that  satisfy  you?  (They  won't  love  me  any  better 
for  making  them  look  fools!)" 

"  Thank  you,"  said  Miss  Gilchrist.  "  We  only  wanted 
to  be  sure." 

The  dinner-bell  rang  as  Dorothy  was  defining  her  po- 
sition. 

"  I'll  work  for  you ;  I'll  speak  for  you ;  I'll  write  for 


i26  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

you;  I'll  fight  for  you.  I'll  make  hay  of  every  Govern- 
ment meeting,  if  I  can  get  in  without  lying  and  sneaking 
for  it.  I'll  go  to  prison  for  you,  if  I  can  choose  my  own 
crime.  But  I  won't  give  up  my  liberty  of  speech  and 
thought  and  action.  I  won't  pledge  myself  to  obey  your 
orders.  I  won't  pledge  myself  not  to  criticize  policy  I 
disapprove  of.  I  won't  come  on  your  Committee,  and  I 
won't  join  your  Union.  Is  that  clear  and  precise 
enough  ? " 

Somebody  clapped  and  somebody  said,  "  Hear, 
Hear !  "     And  somebody  said,  "  Go  it,  Dorothy !  " 

It  was  Anthony  and  Frances  and  Captain  Drayton,  who 
paused  outside  the  door  on  their  way  to  the  dining-room, 
and  listened,  basely. 


They  were  all  going  now.  Dorothy  stood  at  the  door, 
holdiug  it  open  for  them,  glad  that  it  was  all  over. 

Only  Phyllis  Desmond,  the  art-student,  lingered. 
Dorothy  reminded  her  that  they  had  met  at  her  aunt 
Vera  Harrison's  house. 

The  art-student  smiled.  "  I  wondered  when  you  were 
going  to  remember." 

"  I  did,  but  they  all  called  you  Desmond.  That's  what 
put  me  out." 

"  Everybody  calls  me  Desmond.  You  had  a  brother  or 
something  with  you,  hadn't  you  ?  " 

"  I  might  have  had  two.  Which  ?  Michael's  got  green 
eyes  and  yellow  hair.  Nicky's  got  blue  eyes  and  black 
hair." 

"  It  was  Nicky  —  nice  name  —  then." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  127 

Desmond's  beauty  stirred  in  its  sleep.  The  film  of  air 
was  lifted  from  her  black  eyes. 

"  I'm  dining  with  Mrs.  Harrison  tonight,"  she  said. 

"  You'll  be  late  then." 

"  It  doesn't  matter.  Lawrence  Stephen's  never  there 
till  after  eight.     She  won't  dine  ivitliout  him." 

Dorothy  stiffened.  She  did  not  like  that  furtive  be- 
trayal of  Vera  and  LawTence  Stephen. 

"  I  wish  you'd  come  and  see  me  at  my  rooms  in  Chel- 
sea. And  bring  your  brother.  Xot  the  green  and  yellow 
one.     The  blue  and  black  one." 

Dorothy  took  the  card  on  which  Desmond  had  scrib- 
bled an  address.  But  she  did  not  mean  to  go  and  see 
her.     She  wasn't  sure  that  she  liked  Desmond. 


Rosalind  stayed  on  to  dine  with  Dorothy's  family.  She 
was  no  longer  living  with  her  own  family,  for  Mrs.  Jervis 
was  hostile  to  Women's  Franchise.  She  had  rooms  off 
the  Strand,  not  far  from  the  headquarters  of  the  Union. 

Frances  looked  a  little  careworn.  She  had  been  sent 
for  to  Grannie's  house  to  see  what  could  be  done  with 
Aunt  Emmeline,  and  had  found,  as  usual,  that  nothing 
could  be  done  with  her.  In  the  last  three  years  the  sec- 
ond Miss  Fleming  had  become  less  and  less  enthusiastic, 
and  more  and  more  emphatic,  till  she  ceased  from  en- 
thusiasm altogether  and  carried  emphasis  beyond  the 
bounds  of  sanity.  She  had  become,  as  Frances  put  it, 
extremely  tiresome. 

It  was  not  accurate  to  say,  as  Mrs.  Fleming  did,  that 
vou  never  knew  when  Emmeline  would  start  a  nervous 


128  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

crisis;  for  as  a  matter  of  fact  you  could  time  her  to  a 
minute.  It  was  her  habit  to  wait  till  her  family  was 
absorbed  in  some  urgent  affair  that  diverted  attention  from 
her  case,  and  then  to  break  out  alarmingly.  Dorothy  was 
generally  sent  for  to  bring  her  round;  but  to-day  it  was 
Dorothy  who  had  important  things  on  hand.  Aunt 
Emmeline  had  scented  the  Suffrage  meeting  from  afar, 
and  had  made  arrangements  beforehand  for  a  supreme 
crisis  that  would  take  all  the  shine  out  of  Dorothy's 
affair. 

When  Frances  said  that  Aunt  Emmy  had  been  tire- 
some again,  Dorothy  knew  what  she  meant.  Tor  Aunt 
Emmy's  idea  was  that  her  sisters  persecuted  her;  that 
Edie  was  jealous  of  her  and  hated  her;  that  Louie  had 
always  trampled  on  her  and  kept  her  under ;  that  Frances 
had  used  her  influence  with  Grannie  to  spoil  all  her 
chances  one  after  another.  It  was  all  Frances's  fault  that 
Vera  Harrison  had  come  between  her  and  Major  Cam- 
eron; Frances  had  encouraged  Vera  in  her  infamous  in- 
trigue; and  between  them  they  had  wrecked  two  lives. 
And  they  had  killed  Major  Cameron. 

Since  Ferdie's  death  Emmeline  Fleming  had  lived 
most  of  the  time  in  a  sort  of  dream  in  which  it  seemed 
to  her  that  these  things  had  really  happened. 

This  afternoon  she  had  been  more  than  usually  tire- 
some.    She  had  simply  raved. 

"  You  should  have  brought  her  round  to  the  meeting," 
said  Dorothy,  "  and  let  her  rave  there.  I'd  back  Aunt 
Emmeline  against  Maud  Blackadder.  I  wish,  Rosalind, 
you'd  leave  off  making  faces  and  kicking  my  shins.  You 
needn't  worry  any  more,  Mummy  ducky.     I'm  going  to 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  129 

rope  them  all  into  the  Suffrage  Movement.  Aunt  Edie  can 
distribute  literature,  Aunt  Louie  can  interrupt  like  any- 
thing, and  Aunt  Emmeline  can  shout  and  sing." 

"  I  think,  Dorothy,"  said  Kosalind  with  weak  bitter- 
ness, "  that  you  might  have  stuck  by  me." 

The  two  were  walking  down  East  Heath  Road  to  the 
tram-lines  where  the  motor  buses  started  for  Charing 
Cross. 

"  It  was  you  who  dragged  me  into  it,  and  the  least 
you  could  do  was  to  stick.  Why  didn't  you  keep  quiet 
instead  of  forcing  our  hands  ?  " 

"  I  couldn't  keep  quiet.  I'll  go  with  you  straight  or 
I  won't  go  with  you  at  all." 

"  You  know  what's  the  matter  with  you  ?  It's  your 
family.  You'll  never  be  any  good  to  us,  you'll  never  be 
any  good  to  yourself  till  you've  chucked  them  and  got 
away.  For  years  —  ever  since  you've  been  born  —  you've 
simply  been  stewing  there  in  the  family  juice  until 
you're  soaked  with  it.  You  oughtn't  to  be  living  at  home. 
You  ought  to  be  on  your  own  —  like  me." 

"  You're  talking  rot,  Rosalind.  If  my  people  were 
like  yours  I'd  have  to  chuck  them,  I  suppose ;  but  they're 
not.     They're  angels." 

"  That's  why  they're  so  dangerous.  They  couldn't  in- 
fluence you  if  they  weren't  angels." 

"  They  don't  influence  me  the  least  little  bit.  I'd  like 
to  see  them  try.  They're  much  too  clever.  They  know 
I'd  be  off  like  a  shot  if  they  did.  Why,  they  let  me  do 
every  mortal  thing  I  please  —  turn  the  schoolroom  into 
a  meeting  hall  for  your  friends  to  play  the  devil  in. 
That  Blackadder  girl  was  yelling  the  house  down,  yet 


i3o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

they  didn't  say  anything.  And  your  people  aren't  as  bad 
as  you  make  out,  you  know.  You  couldn't  live  on  your 
own  if  your  father  didn't  give  you  an  allowance.  I  like 
Mrs.  Jervis." 

"  Because  she  likes  you." 

"  Well,  that's  a  reason.  It  isn't  the  reason  why  I  like 
my  own  mother,  because  she  doesn't  like  me  so  very  much. 
That's  why  she  lets  me  do  what  I  like.  She  doesn't  care 
enough  to  stop  me.  She  only  really  cares  for  Dad  and 
John  and  Nicky  and  Michael." 

Rosalind  looked  fierce  and  stubborn. 

"  That's  what's  the  matter  with  all  of  you,"  she  said. 

"  What  is  ?  " 

"  Caring  like  that.  It's  all  sex.  Sex  instinct,  sex 
feeling.  Maud's  right.  It's  what  we're  up  against  all 
the  time." 

Dorothy  said  to  herself,  "  That's  what's  the  matter  with 
Rosalind,  if  she  only  knew  it." 

Rosalind  loved  Michael  and  Michael  detested  her, 
and  Nicky  didn't  like  her  very  much.  She  always 
looked  fierce  and  stubborn  when  she  heard  Michael's 
name. 

Rosalind  went  on.  "  When  it  comes  to  sex  you  don't 
revolt.     You  sit  down." 

"  I  do  revolt.  I'm  revolting  now.  I  go  much  farther 
than  you  do.  I  think  the  marriage  laws  are  rotten ;  I 
think  divorce  ought  to  be  for  incompatibility.  I  think 
love  isn't  love  and  can't  last  unless  it's  free.  I  think 
marriage  ought  to  be  abolished  —  not  yet,  perhaps,  but 
when  we've  become  civilized.  It  will  be.  It's  bound  to 
be.     As  it  is,  I  think  every  woman  has  a  righi  to  have  a 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  131 

baby  if  she  wants  one.  If  Emmeline  had  had  a  baby,  she 
wouldn't  be  devastating  us  now." 

"  That's  what  you  think,  but  it  isn't  what  you  feel. 
It's  all  thinking  with  you,  Dorothy.  The  revolt  goes  on 
in  your  brain.  You'll  never  do  anything.  It  isn't  that 
you  haven't  the  courage  to  go  against  your  men.  You 
haven't  the  will.     You  don't  want  to." 

"Why  should  I?  What  do  they  do?  Father  and 
Michael  and  Nicky  don't  interfere  with  me  any  more 
than  Mother  does." 

"  You  know  I'm  not  thinking  of  them.  They  don't 
really  matter." 

"  Who  are  you  thinking  of  then  ?  Frank  Drayton  ? 
You  needn't!" 

It  was  mean  of  Rosalind  to  hit  below  the  belt  like 
that,  when  she  knew  that  she  was  safe.  Michael  had  never 
been  brought  against  her  and  never  would  be.  It  was 
disgusting  of  her  to  imply  that  Dorothy's  state  of  mind 
was  palpable,  when  her  own  (though  sufficiently  advertised 
by  her  behaviour)  had  received  from  Michael's  sister  the 
consecration  of  silence  as  a  secret,  tragic  thing. 

They  had  reached  the  tramlines. 

At  the  sight  of  the  Charing  Cross  'bus  Rosalind  assumed 
an  air  of  rollicking,  adventurous  travel. 

"  My  hat !  What  an  evening !  I  shall  have  a  ripping 
ride  down.  Don't  say  there's  no  room  on  the  top. 
Cheer  up,  Dorothy !  " 

Which  showed  that  Rosalind  Jervis  was  a  free  woman, 
suggested  that  life  had  richer  thrills  than  marrying  Doro- 
thy's brother  Michael,  and  fixed  the  detested  imputation 
securely  on  her  friend. 


132  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Dorothy  watched  her  as  she  swung  herself  on  to  the 
footboard  and  up  the  stair  of  the  motor  bus. 

There  was  room  on  the  top.  Rosalind,  in  fact,  had  the 
top  all  to  herself. 


As  Dorothy  crossed  the  Heath  again  in  the  twilight  she 
saw  something  white  on  the  terrace  of  her  father's  house. 
Her  mother  was  waiting  for  her. 

She  thought  at  first  that  Aunt  Emmeline  had  gone  off 
her  head  and  that  she  had  been  sent  for  to  keep  her  quiet. 
She  gloried  in  their  dependence  on  her.  But  no,  that 
wasn't  likely.  Her  mother  was  just  watching  for  her 
as  she  used  to  watch  for  her  and  the  boys  when  they 
were  little  and  had  been  sent  across  the  Heath  to  Gran- 
nie's house  with  a  message. 

And  at  the  sight  and  memory  of  her  mother  Dorothy 
felt  a  childish,  sick  dissatisfaction  with  herself  and  with 
her  day,  and  an  absurd  longing  for  the  tranquillity  and 
safety  of  the  home  whose  chief  drawback  lately  had  been 
that  it  was  too  tranquil  and  too  safe.  She  could  almost 
have  told  her  mother  how  they  had  all  gone  for  her,  and 
how  Rosalind  had  turned  out  rotten,  and  how  beastly  it 
had  all  been.  Almost,  but  not  quite.  Dorothy  had 
grown  up,  and  she  was  there  to  protect  and  not  to  be  pro- 
tected. However  agreeable  it  might  have  been  to  con- 
fide in  her  mother,  it  wouldn't  have  done. 

Frances  met  her  at  the  garden  door.  She  had  been 
crying. 

"  Nicky's  come  home,"  she  said. 

"Nicky?" 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  133 

"  He's  been  sent  down." 

"  Whatever  for  ?  " 

"  Darling,  I  can't  possibly  tell  you." 

But  in  the  Qnd  she  did. 


XII 

Up  till  now  Frances  had  taken  a  quiet  interest  in 
Women's  Suffrage.  It  bad  got  itself  into  the  papers  and 
thus  become  part  of  the  affairs  of  the  nation.  The  names 
of  Mrs.  P aimer ston-Swete  and  Mrs.  Blathwaite  and  Angela 
Blathwaite  had  got  into  the  papers,  where  Frances  hoped 
and  prayed  that  the  name  of  Dorothea  Harrison  might 
not  follow  them.  The  spectacle  of  a  frantic  Government 
at  grips  with  the  Women's  Franchise  Union  had  not  yet 
received  the  head-lines  accorded  to  the  reports  of  divorce 
and  breach  of  promise  cases  and  fires  in  paraffin  shops; 
still,  it  was  beginning  to  figure,  and  if  Frances's  Times 
ignored  it,  there  were  other  papers  that  Dorothy  brought 
home. 

But  for  Frances  the  affairs  of  the  nation  sank  into  in- 
significance beside  Nicky's  Cambridge  affair. 

There  could  be  no  doubt  that  Nicky's  affair  was  seri- 
ous. You  could  not,  Anthony  said,  get  over  the  letters, 
the  Master's  letter  and  the  Professor's  letter  and  Michael's. 
They  had  arrived  one  hour  after  Nicky,  Nicky  so  changed 
from  his  former  candour  that  he  refused  to  give  any  ac- 
count of  himself  beyond  the  simple  statement  that  he 
had  been  sent  down.  They'd  know,  he  had  said,  soon 
enough  why. 

And  soon  enough  they  did  know. 

To  be  sure  no  details  could  be  disentangled  from  the 
discreet  ambiguities  of  the  Master  and  the  Professor. 
But  Michael's  letter  was  more  explicit.     Nicky  had  been 

i34 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  135 

sent  down  because  old  "  Booster  "  had  got  it  into  his  head 
that  Nicky  had  been  making  love  to  "  Booster's  "  wife 
when  she  didn't  want  to  be  made  love  to,  and  nothing- 
could  get  it  out  of  "  Booster's  "  head. 

Michael  was  bound  to  stand  up  for  his  brother,  and  it 
was  clear  to  Anthony  that  so  grave  a  charge  could  hardly 
have  been  brought  without  some  reason.  The  tone  of  the 
letters,  especially  the  Professor's,  was  extraordinarily  re- 
strained. That  was  what  made  the  thing  stand  out  in 
its  sheer  awfulness.  The  Professor,  although,  according 
to  Michael,  he  conceived  himself  to  be  profoundly  in- 
jured, wrote  sorrowfully,  in  consideration  of  Nicky's 
youth. 

There  was  one  redeeming  circumstance,  the  Master  and 
the  Professor  both  laid  stress  on  it:  Anthony's  son  had 
not  attempted  to  deny  it. 

"  There  must,"  Frances  said  wildly,  "  be  some  terrible 
mistake." 

But  Nicky  cut  the  ground  from  under  the  theory  of  the 
terrible  mistake  by  continuing  in  his  refusal  to  deny 
it. 

"  What  sort  of  woman,"  said  Anthony,  "  is  the  Profes- 
sor's wife  ?  " 

"  Oh,  awfully  decent,"  said  Nicky. 

"  You  had  no  encouragement,  then,  no  provocation  ?  " 

"  She's  awfully  fascinating,"  said  Nicky. 

Then  Frances  had  another  thought.  It  seemed  to  her 
that  Nicky  was  evading. 

"  Are  you  sure  you're  not  screening  somebody  else  ?  " 

"  Screening  somebody  else  ?  Do  you  mean  some  other 
fellow?" 


i36  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Yes.     I'm  not  asking  you  to  give  the  name,  Nicky." 

"  I  swear  I'm  not.  Why  should  I  be  ?  I  can't  think 
why  you're  all  making  such  a  fuss  about  it.  I  don't 
mean  poor  old  '  Booster.'  He's  got  some  cause,  if  you 
like." 

"  But  what  was  it  you  did  —  really  did,  Nicky  ?  " 

"  You've  read  the  letters,  Mother." 

Nicky's  adolescence  seemed  to  die  and  pass  from  him 
there  and  then ;  and  she  saw  a  stubborn,  hard  virility  that 
frightened  and  repelled  her,  forcing  her  to  believe  that 
it  might  have  really  happened. 

To  Frances  the  awfulness  of  it  was  beyond  belief.  And 
the  pathos  of  her  belief  in  Nicky  was  unbearable  to  An- 
thony.    There  were  the  letters. 

"  I  think,  dear,"  Anthony  said,  "  you'd  better  leave 
us." 

"  Mayn't  I  stay  ?  "  It  was  as  if  she  thought  that  by 
staying  she  could  bring  Nicky's  youth  back  to  life  again. 

"  No,"  said  Anthony. 

She  went,  and  Nicky  opened  the  door  for  her.  His 
hard,  tight  man's  face  looked  at  her  as  if  it  had  been 
she  who  had  sinned  and  he  who  suffered,  intolerably,  for 
her  sin.     The  click  of  the  door  as  he  shut  it  stabbed  her. 

"  It's  a  damnable  business,  father.  We'd  better  not 
talk  about  it." 

But  Anthony  would  talk  about  it.  And  when  he  had 
done  talking  all  that  Nicky  had  to  say  was :  "  You  know 
as  well  as  I  do  that  these  things  happen." 


For  Nicky  had  thought  it  out  very  carefully  before- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  137 

hand  in  the  train.  What  else  could  he  say  ?  He  couldn't 
tell  them  that  "  Booster's  "  poor  little  wife  had  lost  her 
head  and  made  hysterical  love  to  him,  and  had  been  so 
frightened  at  what  she  had  done  that  she  had  made  him 
promise  on  his  word  of  honour  that,  whatever  happened, 
he  wouldn't  give  her  away  to  anybody,  not  even  to  his 
own  people. 

He  supposed  that  either  Peggy  had  given  herself  away, 
or  that  poor  old  "  Booster  "  had  found  her  out.  He  sup- 
posed that,  having  found  her  out,  there  was  no  other  line 
that  "  Booster "  could  have  taken.  Anyhow,  there  was 
no  other  line  that  he  could  take;  because,  in  the  world 
where  these  things  happened,  being  found  out  would  be 
fifty  times  worse  for  Peggy  than  it  would  be  for  him. 

He  tried  to  recall  the  scene  in  the  back  drawing-room 
where  she  had  asked  him  so  often  to  have  tea  with  her 
alone.  The  most  vivid  part  was  the  end  of  it,  after  he 
had  given  his  promise.  Peggy  had  broken  down  and  put 
her  head  on  his  shoulder  and  cried  like  anything.  And  it 
was  at  that  moment  that  Nicky  thought  of  "  Booster," 
and  how  awful  and  yet  how  funny  it  would  be  if  he 
walked  into  the  room  and  saw  him  there.  He  had  tried 
hard  not  to  think  what  "  Booster's "  face  would  look 
like;  he  had  tried  hard  not  to  laugh  as  long  as  Peggy's 
head  was  on  his  shoulder,  for  fear  of  hurting  her  feel- 
ings ;  but  when  she  took  it  off  he  did  give  one  half -strangled 
snort;  for  it  really  was  the  rummest  thing  that  had  ever 
happened  to  him. 

He  didn't  know,  and  he  couldn't  possibly  have  guessed, 
that  as  soon  as  the  door  had  shut  on  him  Peggy's  passion 
had  turned  to  rage  and  utter  detestation  of  Nicky  (for 


138  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

she  had  heard  the  snort)  ;  and  that  she  had  gone  straight 
to  her  husband's  study  and  put  her  head  on  his  shoulder, 
and  cried,  and  told  him  a  lie;  and  that  it  was  Peggy's 
lie  and  not  the  Professor's  imagination  that  had  caused 
him  to  be  sent  down.  And  even  if  Peggy  had  not  been 
Lord  Somebody's  daughter  and  related  to  all  sorts  of  in- 
fluential people  she  would  still  have  been  capable  of  turn- 
ing every  male  head  in  the  University.  For  she  was  a 
small,  gentle  woman  with  enchanting  manners  and  the 
most  beautiful  and  pathetic  eyes,  and  she  had  not  yet 
been  found  out.  Therefore  it  was  more  likely  that  an 
undergraduate  with  a  face  like  Nicky's  should  lose  his 
head  than  that  a  woman  with  a  face  like  Peggy's  should, 
for  no  conceivable  reason,  tell  a  lie.  So  that,  even  if 
Nicky's  word  of  honour  had  not  been  previously  pledged 
to  his  accuser,  it  would  have  had  no  chance  against  any 
statement  that  she  chose  to  make.  And  even  if  he  had 
known  that  she  had  lied,  he  couldn't  very  well  have  given 
it  against  poor  pretty  Peggy  who  had  lost  her  head  and 
got  frightened. 

As  Nicky  packed  up  his  clothes  and  his  books  he  said,  "  I 
don't  care  if  I  am  sent  down.  It  would  have  been  fifty 
times  worse  for  her  than  it  is  for  me." 

He  had  no  idea  how  bad  it  was,  nor  how  much  worse 
it  was  going  to  be.  For  it  ended  in  his  going  that  night 
from  his  father's  house  to  the  house  in  St.  John's  Wood 
where  Vera  and  Mr.  Lawrence  Stephen  lived. 

And  it  was  there  that  he  met  Desmond. 


Nicky  congratulntof]  Vn'msolf  on  having  pulled  it  off  so 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  139 

well.  At  the  same  time  lie  was  a  little  surprised  at  the 
ease  with  which  he  had  taken  his  father  and  mother  in. 
He  might  have  understood  it  if  he  had  known  that  Vera 
had  been  before  him,  and  that  she  had  warned  them  long 
ago  that  this  was  precisely  the  sort  of  thing  they  would 
have  to  look  out  for.  And  as  no  opinion  ever  uttered  on 
the  subject  of  their  children  was  likely  to  be  forgotten 
by  Frances  and  Anthony,  when  this  particular  disaster 
came  they  were  more  prepared  for  it  than  they  would  have 
believed  possible. 

But  there  were  two  members  of  his  family  whom  Nicky 
had  failed  altogether  to  convince,  Michael  and  Dorothy. 
Michael  luckily,  Nicky  said  to  himself,  was  not  on  the 
spot,  and  his  letter  had  no  weight  against  the  letters  of 
the  Master  and  the  Professor,  and  on  this  also  Nicky  had 
calculated.  He  reckoned  without  Dorothy,  judging  it 
hardly  likely  that  she  would  be  allowed  to  know  anything 
about  it.  Nobody,  not  even  Frances,  was  yet  aware  of 
Dorothy's  importance. 

And  Dorothy,  because  of  her  importance,  blamed  herself 
for  all  that  happened  afterwards.  If  she  had  not  had  that 
damned  Suffrage  meeting,  Rosalind  would  not  have  stayed 
to  dinner ;  if  Rosalind  had  not  stayed  to  dinner  she  would 
not  have  gone  with  her  to  the  tram-lines ;  if  she  had  not 
gone  with  her  to  the  tram-lines  she  would  have  been 
at  home  to  stop  Nicky  from  going  to  St.  John's  Wood. 
As  it  was,  Nicky  had  reached  the  main  road  at  the  top 
of  the  lane  just  as  Dorothy  was  entering  it  from  the 
bottom. 

At  first  Frances  did  not  want  Dorothy  to  see  her  father. 
He  was  most  horribly  upset  and  must  not  be  disturbed. 


140  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

But  Dorothy  insisted.  Her  father  had  the  letters,  and 
she  must  see  the  letters. 

"  I  may  understand  them  better  than  you  or  Daddy," 
she  said.  "  You  see,  Mummy,  I  know  these  Cambridge 
people.     They're  awful  asses,  some  of  them." 

And  though  her  mother  doubted  whether  attendance  at 
the  Professor's  lectures  would  give  Dorothy  much  insight 
into  the  affair,  she  had  her  way.  Anthony  was  too  weak 
to  resist  her.  He  pushed  the  letters  towards  her  with- 
out a  word.  He  would  rather  she  had  been  left  out  of  it. 
And  yet  somehow  the  sight  of  her,  coming  in,  so  robust  and 
undismayed  and  competent,  gave  him  a  sort  of  comfort. 

Dorothy  did  not  agree  with  Michael.  There  was  more 
in  it  than  the  Professor's  imagination.  The  Professor, 
she  said,  hadn't  got  any  imagination ;  you  could  tell  from 
the  way  he  lectured.  But  she  did  not  believe  one  word  of 
the  charge  against  her  brother.  Something  had  happened 
and  Nicky  was  screening  somebody. 

"  I'll  bet  you  anything  you  like,"  said  Dorothy,  "  it's 
*  Booster's  '  wife.     She's  made  him  give  his  word." 

Dorothy  was  sure  that  "  Booster's  "  wife  was  a  bad  lot. 

"  Nicky  said  she  was  awfully  decent." 

"  He'd  have  to.     He  couldn't  do  it  by  halves." 

"  They  couldn't  have  sent  him  down,  unless  they'd 
sifted  the  thing  to  the  bottom." 

"  I  daresay  they've  sifted  all  they  could,  the  silly 
asses." 

She  could  have  killed  them  for  making  her  father  suffer. 
The  sight  of  his  drawn  face  hurt  her  abominably.  She 
had  never  seen  him  like  that.  She  wasn't  half  so  sorry 
for  her  mother  who  was  sustained  by  a  secret,  ineradicable 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  141 

faith  in  Nicky.  Why  couldn't  he  have  faith  in  Nicky 
too?  Was  it  because  he  was  a  man  and  knew  that  these 
things  happened  % 

"  Daddy  —  being  sent  down  isn't  such  an  awful  calam- 
ity. It  isn't  going  to  blast  his  career  or  anything.  It's 
always  touch  and  go.  I  might  have  been  sent  down  any 
day.  I  should  have  been  if  they'd  known  about  me  half 
what  they  don't  know  about  Nicky.  Why  can't  you  take 
it  as  a  rag  ?     You  bet  lie  does." 

Anthony  removed  himself  from  her  protecting  hand. 
He  got  up  and  went  to  bed. 

But  he  did  not  sleep  there.  Neither  he  nor  Frances 
slept.  And  he  came  down  in  the  morning  looking  worse 
than  ever. 

Dorothy  thought,  "  It  must  be  awful  to  have  children 
if  it  makes  you  feel  like  that."  She  thought,  "  It's  a 
lucky  thing  they're  not  likely  to  cut  up  the  same  way 
about  me."  She  thought  again,  "  It  must  be  awful  to 
have  children."  She  thought  of  the  old  discussions  in 
her  room  at  Newnham,  about  the  woman's  right  to  the 
child,  and  free  union,  and  easy  divorce,  and  the  abolition 
of  the  family.  Her  own  violent  and  revolutionary 
speeches  (for  which  she  liked  to  think  she  might  have 
been  sent  down)  sounded  faint  and  far-oif  and  irrelevant. 
She  did  not  really  want  to  abolish  Frances  and  Anthony. 
And  yet,  if  they  had  been  abolished,  as  part  of  the  de- 
plorable institution  of  parentage,  it  would  have  been  bet- 
ter for  them ;  for  then  they  would  not  be  suffering  as  they 
did. 

It  must  be  awful  to  have  children.  But  perhaps  they 
knew  that  it  was  worth  it. 


i42  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  as  her  thoughts  travelled  that  way  they  were  over- 
taken all  of  a  sudden  by  an  idea.  She  did  not  stop  to 
ask  herself  what  business  her  idea  had  in  that  neighbour- 
hood. She  went  down  first  thing  after  breakfast  and 
sent  off  two  wires;  one  to  Captain  Drayton  at  Croft 
House,  Eltham;  one  to  the  same  person  at  the  Royal 
Military  Academy,  Woolwich. 

"  Can  I  see  you  ?     It's  about  Nicky. 

"  Dorothy  Harrison." 

Wires  to  show  that  she  was  impersonal  and  business- 
like, and  that  her  business  was  urgent.  "  Can  I  see  you  ?  " 
to  show  that  he  was  not  being  invited  to  see  her.  "  It's 
about  Nicky  "  to  justify  the  whole  proceeding.  "  Doro- 
thy Harrison "  because  "  Dorothy "  by  itself  was  too 
much. 


As  soon  as  she  had  sent  off  her  wires  Dorothy  felt  a 
sense  of  happiness  and  well-being.  She  had  no  grounds 
for  happiness ;  far  otherwise ;  her  great  friendship  with 
Rosalind  Jervis  was  disintegrating  bit  by  bit  owing  to 
Rosalind's  behaviour;  the  fiery  Suffrage  meeting  had 
turned  into  dust  and  ashes;  her  darling  Nicky  was  in 
a  nasty  scrape ;  her  father  and  mother  were  utterly  miser- 
able; yet  she  was  happy. 

Half-way  home  her  mind  began  to  ask  questions  of  its 
own  accord. 

"  Supposing  you  had  to  choose  between  the  Suffrage  and 
Frank  Drayton  ?  " 

"  But  I  haven't  got  to." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  143 

"  You  might  have.     You  know  you  might  any  minute. 
You  know  he  hates  it.     And  supposing  — " 
But  Dorothy  refused  to  give  any  answer. 
His  wire  came  within  the  next  half  hour. 

"  Coming  three  sharp.     Fkank." 

Her  sense  of  well-being  increased  almost  to  exaltation. 

He  arrived  with  punctuality  at  three  o'clock.  (He 
was  in  the  gunners  and  had  a  job  at  Woolwich.)  She 
found  him  standing  on  the  hearth-rug  in  the  drawing-room. 
He  had  blown  his  nose  when  he  heard  her  coming,  and 
that  meant  that  he  was  nervous.  She  caught  him  stuffing 
his  pocket-handkerchief  (a  piece  of  damning  evidence) 
into  his  breast-pocket. 

With  her  knowledge  of  his  nervousness  her  exaltation 
ceased  as  if  it  had  not  been.  At  the  sight  of  him  it  was 
as  if  the  sentence  hidden  somewhere  in  her  mind  — 
"  You'll  have  to  choose.  You  know  you'll  have  to  " — 
escaping  thought  and  language,  had  expressed  itself  in 
one  suffocating  pang.  Unless  Nicky's  affair  staved  off 
the  dreadful  moment. 

"  Were  you  frightfully  busy  ?  " 

'*  No,  thank  goodness." 

The  luck  she  had  had !  Of  course,  if  he  had  been  busy 
he  couldn't  possibly  have  come. 

She  could  look  at  him  now  without  a  tightening  in  her 
throat.  She  liked  to  look  at  him.  He  was  made  all  of  one 
piece.  She  liked  his  square  face  and  short  fine  hair, 
both  the  colour  of  light-brown  earth ;  his  eyes,  the  colour 
of  light  brown  earth  under  clear  water;  eyes  that  looked 


144  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

small  because  they  were  set  so  deep.  She  liked  their  sud- 
den narrowing  and  their  deep  wrinkles  when  he  smiled. 
She  liked  his  jutting  chin,  and  the  fine,  rather  small  mouth 
that  jerked  his  face  slightly  crooked  when  he  laughed.  She 
liked  that  slender  crookedness  that  made  it  a  face  re- 
markable and  unique  among  faces.  She  liked  his  brains. 
She  liked  all  that  she  had  ever  seen  or  heard  of  him. 

Vera  had  told  them  that  once,  at  an  up-country  sta- 
tion in  India,  he  had  stopped  a  mutiny  in  a  native  battery 
by  laughing  in  the  men's  faces.  Somebody  that  Ferdie 
knew  had  been  with  him  and  saw  it  happen.  The  men 
broke  into  his  office  where  he  was  sitting,  vulnerably,  in 
his  shirt-sleeves.  They  had  brought  knives  with  them, 
beastly  native  things,  and  they  had  their  hands  on  the 
handles,  ready.  They  screamed  and  gesticulated  with  ex- 
citement. And  Frank  Drayton  leaned  back  in  his  office 
chair  and  looked  at  them,  and  burst  out  laughing,  because, 
he  said,  they  made  such  funny  faces.  When  they  got 
to  fingering  their  knives,  he  tilted  back  his  chair  and 
rocked  with  laughter.  His  sudden,  incredible  mirth 
frightened  them  and  stopped  the  mutiny.  She  could  see 
him,  she  could  see  his  face  jerked  crooked  with  delight. 

That  was  the  sort  of  thing  that  Nicky  would  have  done. 
She  loved  him  for  that.  She  loved  him  because  he  was 
like  Nicky. 

She  was  not  able  to  recall  the  process  of  the  states  that 
flowered  in  that  mysterious  sense  of  well-being  and  exal- 
tation. A  year  ago  Frank  Drayton  had  been  only  "  that 
nice  man  we  used  to  meet  at  Cheltenham."  First  of  all 
he  had  been  Ferdie's  and  Vera's  friend.     Then  he  became 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  145 

Nicky's  friend;  the  only  one  who  took  a  serious  interest 
in  his  inventions  and  supported  him  when  he  wanted  to 
go  into  the  Army  and  consoled  him  when  he  was  frus- 
trated. Then  he  had  become  the  friend  of  the  family. 
Now  he  was  recognized  as  more  particularly  Dorothea's 
friend. 

At  Cheltenham  he  had  been  home  on  leave;  and  it  was 
not  until  this  year  that  he  had  got  his  job  at  Woolwich 
teaching  gunnery,  while  he  waited  for  a  bigger  job  in 
the  Ordnance  Department.  Perdie  Cameron  had  always 
said  that  Frank  Drayton  would  be  worth  watching.  He 
would  be  part  of  the  brains  of  the  Army  some  day.  Nicky 
watched  him.  His  brains  and  their  familiarity  with 
explosives  and  the  machinery  of  warfare  had  been  his 
original  attraction  for  Nicky.  But  it  was  Dorothea  who 
watched  him  most. 

She  plunged  abruptly  into  Nicky's  affair,  giving  names 
and  lineage.  "  You  know  all  sorts  of  people,  do  you 
know  anything  about  her  ?  " 

He  looked  at  her  clearly,  without  smiling.  Then  he 
said  "  Yes.  I  know  a  good  bit  about  her.  Is  that  what's 
wrong  with  Nicky  ?  " 

"  Not  exactly.     But  he's  been  sent  down." 

His  wry  smile  intimated  that  such  things  might  be. 

Then  she  told  him  what  the  Master  had  written  and 
what  the  Professor  had  written  and  what  Michael  had 
written,  and  what  Nicky  had  said,  and  what  she,  Doro- 
thea, thought.  Drayton  smiled  over  the  Master's  and  the 
Professor's  letters,  but  when  it  came  to  Michael's  letter 
he  laughed  aloud. 


146  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  It's  all  very  well  for  us.  But  Daddy  and  Mummy 
are  breaking  their  hearts.  Daddy  says  he's  going  down 
to  Cambridge  to  see  what  really  did  happen." 

Again  that  clear  look.  She  gathered  that  he  disap- 
proved of  "  Booster's  "  wife.  He  disapproved  of  so  many 
things :  of  Women's  Suffrage ;  of  revolutions ;  of  women 
who  revolted;  of  anybody  who  revolted;  of  Mrs.  Palmer- 
ston-Swete  and  Mrs.  Blathwaite  and  Angela  Blathwaite. 
It  was  putting  it  too  mildly  to  say  he  disapproved  of  Rosa- 
lind Jervis;  he  detested  her.  He  disapproved  of  Vera 
and  of  her  going  to  see  Vera ;  she  remembered  that  he  had 
even  disapproved,  long  ago,  of  poor  Ferdie,  though  he 
liked  him.  Evidently  he  disapproved  of  "  Booster's " 
wife  for  the  same  reason  that  he  disapproved  of  Vera. 
That  was  why  he  didn't  say  so. 

"  I  believe  you  think  all  the  time  I'm  right,"  she  said. 
"  Would  you  go  down  if  you  were  he  ?  " 

"  No.     I  wouldn't." 

"  Why  not  ?  " 

"  Because  he  won't  get  anything  out  of  them.  They 
can't  give  her  away  any  more  than  Nicky  can.  Or  than 
you  can,  Dorothy." 

"  You  mean  I've  done  it  already  —  to  you.  I  had  to, 
because  of  Nicky.  I  can't  help  it  if  you  do  think  it  was 
beastly  of  me." 

"  My  dear  child  — " 

He  got  up  vehemently,  as  if  his  idea  was  to  take  her 
in  his  arms  and  stifle  her  outbreak  that  way.  But  some- 
thing in  her  eyes,  cold,  unready,  yet  aware  of  him,  re- 
pelled him. 

He  thought :     "  It's  too  soon.     She's   all  rigid.     She 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  147 

isn't  alive  yet.  That's  not  what  she  wired  for."  He 
thought :  "  I  wish  people  wouldn't  send  their  children  to 
Newnham.     It  retards  their  development  by  ten  years." 

And  she  thought :  "  No.  I  mustn't  let  him  do  that. 
For  then  he  won't  be  able  to  go  back  on  me  when  I  tell 
him  my  opinions.  It  would  be  simply  trapping  him. 
Supposing  —  supposing  — " 

She  did  not  know  that  that  instinctive  renunciation 
was  her  answer  to  the  question.  Her  honour  would  come 
first. 

"  Of  course.     Of  course  you  had  to." 

"  What  would  you  do  about  it  if  you  were  Daddy  ?  " 

"  I  should  send  them  all  to  blazes." 

"  No,  but  really  do  ?  " 

"  I  should  do  nothing.  I  should  leave  it.  You'll  find 
that  before  very  long  there'll  be  letters  of  apology  and 
restitution." 

"  Will  you  come  down  to  the  office  with  me  and  tell 
Daddy  that  ?  " 

"  Yes,  if  you'll  come  to  tea  with  me  somewhere  after- 
wards." 

(He  really  couldn't  be  expected  to  do  all  this  for  noth- 
ing.) 

She  sent  her  mother  to  him  while  she  put  on  her  hat 
and  coat.     When  she  came  down  Frances  was  happy  again. 

"  You  see,  Mummy,  I  was  right,  after  all." 

"  You  always  were  right,  darling,  all  the  time." 

For  the  life  of  her  she  couldn't  help  giving  that  little 
flick  at  her  infallible  daughter. 

"  She  is  right  —  most  of  the  time,"  said  Drayton.  His 
eyes  covered  and  protected  her. 


148  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Anthony  was  in  his  office,  sitting  before  the  open  doors 
of  the  cabinet  where  he  kept  his  samples  of  rare  and  valu- 
able woods.  The  polished  slabs  were  laid  before  him  on 
the  table  in  rows,  as  he  had  arranged  them  to  show  to 
a  customer:  wine-coloured  mahogany,  and  golden  satin- 
wood;  ebony  black  as  jet;  tulip-wood  mottled  like  fine 
tortoiseshell ;  coromandel  wood,  striped  black  and  white 
like  the  coat  of  a  civet  cat;  ghostly  basswood,  shining 
white  on  dead  white;  woods  of  clouded  grain,  and  woods 
of  shining  grain,  grain  that  showed  like  the  slanting, 
splintered  lines  of  hewn  stone,  like  moss,  like  the  veins  of 
flowers,  the  fringes  of  birds'  feathers,  the  striping  and 
dappling  of  beasts;  woods  of  exquisite  grain  where  the 
life  of  the  tree  drew  its  own  image  in  its  own  heart; 
woods  whose  surface  was  tender  to  the  touch  like  a  fine 
tissue;  and  sweet-smelling  sandalwood  and  camphor-wood 
and  cedar. 

Anthony  loved  his  shining,  polished  slabs  of  wood.  If 
a  man  must  have  a  business,  let  it  be  timber.  Timber 
was  a  clean  and  fine  and  noble  thing.  He  had  brought 
the  working  of  his  business  to  such  a  pitch  of  smooth 
perfection  that  his  two  elder  sons,  Michael  and  Nicholas, 
could  catch  up  with  it  easily  and  take  it  in  their  stride. 

Now  he  was  like  a  sick  child  that  has  ranged  all  its 
toys  in  front  of  it  and  finds  no  comfort  in  them. 

And,  as  he  looked  at  them,  the  tulip-wood  and  the 
scented  sandalwood  and  camphor-wood  gave  him  an  idea. 

The  Master  and  the  Professor  had  both  advised  him  to 
send  his  son  Nicholas  out  of  England  for  a  little  while. 
"  Let  him  travel  for  six  months  and  get  the  whole  miser- 
able business  out  of  his  head," 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  149 

Nicky,  when  he  gave  up  the  Array,  had  told  him  flatly 
that  he  would  rather  die  than  spend  his  life  sitting  in  a 
beastly  office.  Nicky  had  put  it  to  him  that  timber  meant 
trees,  and  trees  meant  forests;  why,  lots  of  the  stuff  they 
imported  came  from  the  Himalaya  and  the  West  Indies 
and  Ceylon.  He  had  reminded  him  that  he  was  always 
saying  a  timber  merchant  couldn't  know  enough  about  the 
living  tree.  Why  shouldn't  he  go  into  the  places  where 
the  living  trees  grew  and  learn  all  about  them?  Why 
shouldn't  he  be  a  tree-expert?  Since  they  were  special- 
izing in  rare  and  foreign  woods,  why  shouldn't  he  spe- 
cialize in  rare  and  foreign  trees  ? 

And  the  slabs  of  tulip-wood  and  scented  camphor-wood 
and  sandalwood  were  saying  to  Anthony,  "  Why  not  ?  " 
Neither  he  nor  Frances  had  wanted  Nicky  to  go  off  to 
the  West  Indies  and  the  Himalaya ;  but  now,  since  clearly 
he  must  go  off  somewhere,  why  not  ? 

Drayton  and  Dorothy  came  in  just  as  Anthony  (still 
profoundly  dejected)  was  saying  to  himself,  "  Reinstate 
him.  Give  him  responsibility  —  curiosity  —  healthy  in- 
terests. Get  the  whole  miserable  business  out  of  his 
head." 

It  seemed  incredible,  after  what  they  had  gone  through, 
that  Drayton  should  be  standing  there,  telling  him  that 
there  was  nothing  in  it,  that  there  never  had  been  any 
miserable  business,  that  it  was  all  a  storm  in  a  hysterical 
woman's  teacup.  He  blew  the  whole  dirty  nightmare  to 
nothing  with  the  laughter  that  was  like  Nicky's  own 
laughter. 

Then  Anthony  and  Drayton  and  Dorothy  sat  round  the 
table,  drafting  letters  to  the  Master  and  the  Professor. 


i5o  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Anthony,  at  Drayton's  dictation,  informed  them  that  he 
regretted  the  step  they  had  seen  fit  to  take;  that  he  knew 
his  own  son  well  enough  to  be  pretty  certain  that  there 
had  been  some  misunderstanding;  therefore,  unless  he 
received  within  three  days  a  written  withdrawal  of  the 
charge  against  his  son  Nicholas,  he  would  be  obliged  to 
remove  his  son  Michael  from  the  Master's  College. 

The  idea  of  removing  Michael  was  Anthony's  own  in- 
spiration. 

Drayton's  advice  was  that  he  should  give  Nicky  his 
choice  between  Oxford  and  Germany,  the  big  School  of 
Forestry  at  Aschaffenburg.  If  he  chose  Germany,  he 
would  be  well  grounded;  he  could  specialize  and  travel 
afterwards. 

"  Now  that's  all  over,"  Anthony  said,  "  you  two  had 
better  come  and  have  tea  with  me  somewhere." 

But  there  was  something  in  their  faces  that  made  him 
consult  his  watch  and  find  that  "  Oh  dear  me,  no !  he  was 
afraid  he  couldn't."     He  had  an  appointment  at  five. 

When  they  were  well  out  of  sight  he  locked  up  his  toys 
in  his  cabinet,  left  the  appointment  at  five  to  Mr.  Vereker, 
and  went  home  to  tell  Frances  about  the  letters  he  had 
written  to  Cambridge  and  the  plans  that  had  been  made 
for  Nicky's  future. 

"  He'll  choose  Germany,"  Anthony  said.  "  But  that 
can't  be  helped." 

Frances  agreed  that  they  could  hardly  have  hit  upon  a 
better  plan. 

So  the  affair  of  Nicky  and  "  Booster's  "  wife  was  as  if 
it  had  never  been.  And  for  that  they  thanked  the  blessed 
common  sense  and  sanity  of  Captain  Drayton. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  151 

And  yet  Anthony's  idea  was  wrecked  by  "  Booster's  " 
wife.  It  had  come  too  late.  Anthony  had  overlooked  the 
fact  that  his  son  had  seventeen  hours'  start  of  him.  He  was 
unaware  of  the  existence  of  Nicky's  own  idea ;  and  he  had 
not  allowed  for  the  stiff  logic  of  his  position. 

When  he  drove  down  in  his  car  to  St.  John's  Wood 
to  fetch  Nicky,  he  found  that  he  had  left  that  after- 
noon for  Chelsea,  where,  Vera  told  him,  he  had  taken 
rooms. 

She  gave  him  the  address.  It  had  no  significance  for 
Anthony. 

Nicky  refused  to  be  fetched  back  from  his  rooms  in 
Chelsea.  For  he  had  not  left  his  father's  house  in  a 
huff ;  he  had  left  it  in  his  wisdom,  to  avoid  the  embarrass- 
ment of  an  incredible  position.  His  position,  as  he 
pointed  out  to  his  father,  had  not  changed.  He  was  as 
big  a  blackguard  to-day  as  he  was  yesterday;  the  only 
difference  was,  that  to-morrow  or  the  next  day  he  would 
be  a  self-supporting  blackguard. 

He  wouldn't  listen  to  his  father's  plan.  It  was  a  beau- 
tiful plan,  but  it  would  only  mean  spending  more  money 
on  him.  He'd  be  pretty  good,  he  thought,  at  looking  after 
machinery.  He  was  going  to  try  for  a  job  as  a  chauffeur 
or  foreman  mechanic.  He  thought  he  knew  where  he 
could  get  one;  but  supposing  he  couldn't  get  it,  if  his 
father  cared  to  take  him  on  at  the  works  for  a  bit  he'd 
come  like  a  shot ;  but  he  couldn't  stay  there,  because  it 
wouldn't  be  good  enough. 

He  was  absolutely  serious,  and  absolutely  firm  in  the 
logic  of  his  position.  For  he  argued  that,  if  he  allowed 
himself  to  be  taken  back  as  though  nothing  had  happened, 


i52  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

this,  more  than  anything  he  could  well  think  of,  would 
be  giving  Peggy  away. 

He  sent  his  love  to  his  mother  and  Dorothy,  and  prom- 
ised to  come  out  and  dine  with  them  as  soon  as  he  had 
got  his  job. 

So  Anthony  drove  back  without  him.  But  as  he  drove 
he  smiled.     And  Frances  smiled,  too,  when  he  told  her. 

"  There  he  is,  the  young  monkey,  and  there  he'll  stay. 
It's  magnificent,  but  of  course  he's  an  ass." 

"  If  you  can't  be  an  ass  at  twenty,"  said  Frances, 
"  when  can  you  be  ?  " 

They  said  it  was  so  like  Nicky.  Tor  all  he  knew  to 
the  contrary  his  career  was  ruined;  but  he  didn't  care. 
You  couldn't  make  any  impression  on  him.  They  won- 
dered if  anybody  ever  would. 

Dorothy  wondered  too. 

"  What  sort  of  rooms  has  he  got,  Anthony  ? "  said 
Trances. 

"  Very  nice  rooms,  at  the  top  of  the  house,  looking  over 
the  river." 

"  Darling  Nicky,  I  shall  go  and  see  him.  What  are 
you  thinking  of,  Dorothy  ?  " 

Dorothy  was  thinking  that  Nicky's  address  at  Chelsea 
was  the  address  that  Desmond  had  given  her  yesterday. 


XIII 

When  Frances  heard  that  Nicholas  was  going  about 
everywhere  with  the  painter  girl  they  called  Desmond, 
she  wrote  to  Vera  to  come  and  see  her.  She  could  never 
bring  herself  to  go  to  the  St.  John's  Wood  house  that  was 
so  much  more  Mr.  Lawrence  Stephen's  house  than  it  was 
Vera's. 

The  three  eldest  children  went  now  and  then,  refusing 
to  go  back  on  Vera.  Frances  did  not  like  it,  but  she  had 
not  interfered  with  their  liberty  so  far  as  to  forbid  it 
positively;  for  she  judged  that  frustration  might  create 
an  appetite  for  Mr.  Stephen's  society  that  otherwise  they 
might  not,  after  all,  acquire. 

Vera  understood  that  her  husband's  brother  and  sister- 
in-law  could  hardly  be  expected  to  condone  her  last  aber- 
ration. Her  attachment  to  Ferdie  Cameron  had  been 
different.  It  was  inevitable,  and  in  a  sense  forgivable, 
seeing  that  it  had  been  brought  about  by  Bartie's  sheer  im- 
possibility. Besides,  the  knowledge  of  it  had  dawned  on 
them  so  gradually  and  through  so  many  stages  of  extenuat- 
ing tragedy,  that,  even  when  it  became  an  open  certainty, 
the  benefit  of  the  long  doubt  remained.  And  there  was 
Veronica.  There  was  still  Veronica.  Even  without  Ve- 
ronica Vera  would  have  had  to  think  of  something  far  worse 
than  Lawrence  Stephen  before  Frances  would  have  cast  her 
off.  Frances  felt  that  it  was  not  for  her  to  sit  in  judgment 
under  the  shelter  of  her  tree  of  Heaven.  Supposing  she 
could  only  have  had  Anthony  as  Vera  had  had  Ferdie, 

iS3 


154  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

could  she  have  lived  without  him?  For  Frances  noth- 
ing in  the  world  had  any  use  or  interest  or  significance  but 
her  husband  and  her  children ;  her  children  first,  and  An- 
thony after  them.  For  Vera  nothing  in  the  world  counted 
but  her  lover. 

"  If  only  I  were  as  sure  of  Lawrence  as  you  are  of  An- 
thony !  "  she  would  say. 

Yet  she  lived  the  more  intensely,  if  the  more  danger- 
ously, through  the  very  risks  of  her  exposed  and  forbidden 
love. 

Vera  was  without  fidelity  to  the  unreturning  dead;  but 
she  made  up  for  it  by  an  incorruptible  adoration  of  the 
living.  And  she  had  been  made  notorious  chiefly  through 
Stephen's  celebrity,  which  was,  you  might  say,  a  pure 
accident. 

Thus  Frances  made  shelter  for  her  friend.  Only  Vera 
must  be  made  to  understand  that,  though  she  was  ac- 
cepted Lawrence  Stephen  was  not.  He  was  the  point  at 
which  toleration  ceased. 

And  Vera  did  understand.  She  understood  that 
Frances  and  Anthony  disapproved  of  her  last  adventure 
considerably  more  on  Ferdie's  and  Veronica's  account 
than  on  Bartie's.  Even  family  loyalty  could  not  espouse 
Bartie's  cause  with  any  zest.  For  Bartie  showed  himself 
implacable.  Over  and  over  again  she  had  implored  him 
to  divorce  her  so  that  Lawrence  might  marry  her,  and 
over  and  over  again  he  had  refused.  His  idea  was  to  as- 
sert himself  by  refusals.  In  that  way  he  could  still  feel 
that  he  had  power  over  her  and  a  sort  of  possession.  It 
was  he  who  was  scandalous.  Even  now  neither  Frances 
nor  Anthony  had  a  word  to  say  for  him. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  155 

So  Vera  consented  to  be  received  surreptitiously,  by  her- 
self, and  without  receiving  Frances  and  Anthony  in  her 
turn.  It  had  hurt  her;  but  Stephen's  celebrity  was  a 
dressing  to  her  wound.  He  was  so  distinguished  that  it 
was  unlikely  that  Frances,  or  Anthony  either,  would 
ever  have  been  received  by  him  without  Vera.  She  came, 
looking  half  cynical,  half  pathetic,  her  beauty  a  little 
blurred,  a  little  beaten  after  seventeen  years  of  passion 
and  danger,  saying  that  she  wasn't  going  to  force  Larry 
down  their  throats  if  they  didn't  like  him;  and  she  went 
away  sustained  by  her  sense  of  his  distinction  and  his 
repudiations. 

And  she  found  further  support  in  her  knowledge  that, 
if  Frances  and  Anthony  could  resist  Lawrence,  their 
children  couldn't.  Michael  and  Dorothy  were  acquiring 
a  taste  for  him  and  for  the  people  he  knew ;  and  he  knew 
almost  everybody  who  was  worth  knowing.  To  be  seen  at 
the  parties  he  and  Vera  gave  in  St.  John's  Wood  was  it- 
self distinction.  Vera  had  never  forgotten  and  never 
would  forget  what  Anthony  and  Frances  had  done  for  her 
and  Ferdie  when  they  took  Veronica.  She  wanted  to 
make  up,  to  pay  back,  to  help  their  children  as  they  had 
helped  her  child;  to  give  the  best  she  had,  and  do  what 
they,  poor  darlings,  couldn't  possibly  have  done.  Nich- 
olas was  all  right ;  but  Michael's  case  was  lamentable.  In 
his  family  and  in  the  dull  round  of  their  acquaintance 
there  was  not  anybody  who  was  likely  to  be  of  the  least 
use  to  Michael;  not  anybody  that  he  cared  to  know.  No 
wonder  that  he  kept  up  his  old  attitude  of  refusing  to 
go  to  the  party.  Lawrence  Stephen  had  promised  her  that 
he  would  help  Michael. 


156  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  Frances  was  afraid.  She  saw  her  children, 
Michael,  Nicholas  and  Dorothy,  swept  every  day  a  little 
farther  from  the  firm,  well-ordered  sanctities,  a  little 
nearer  to  the  unclean  moral  vortex  that  to  her  was  the 
most  redoubtable  of  all.  She  hid  her  fear,  because  in 
her  wisdom  she  knew  that  to  show  fear  was  not  the  way 
to  keep  her  children.  She  hid  her  strength  because  she 
knew  that  to  show  it  was  not  the  way.  Her  strength  was 
in  their  love  of  her.  She  had  only  used  it  once  when  she 
had  stopped  Nicky  from  going  into  the  Army.  She  had 
said  to  herself  then,  "  I  will  never  do  that  again."  It 
wasn't  fair.  It  was  a  sort  of  sacrilege,  a  treachery.  Love 
was  holy;  it  should  never  be  used,  never  be  bargained 
with.  She  tried  to  hold  the  balance  even  between  their 
youth  and  their  maturity. 

So  Frances  fought  her  fear. 

She  had  known  that  Ferdie  Cameron  was  good,  as  she 
put  it,  "  in  spite  of  everything  " ;  but  she  had  not  seen 
Lawrence  Stephen,  and  she  did  not  know  that  he  had  sen- 
sibilities and  prejudices  and  scruples  like  her  own,  and 
that  he  and  Vera  distinguished  very  carefully  between  the 
people  who  would  be  good  for  Michael  and  Nicholas  and 
Dorothy,  and  the  people  who  would  not.  She  did  not 
know  that  they  both  drew  the  line  at  Desmond. 

Vera  protested  that  it  was  not  her  fault,  it  was  not 
Lawrence's  fault  that  Nicky  had  met  Desmond.  She  had 
never  asked  them  to  meet  each  other.  She  did  not  deny 
that  it  was  in  her  house  they  had  met ;  but  she  had  not  in- 
troduced them.  Desmond  had  introduced  herself,  on  the 
grounds  that  she  knew  Dorothy.  Vera  suspected  that, 
from  the  first  moment  when  she  had  seen  him  there  — 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  157 

by  pure  accident  —  she  had  marked  him  down.  Very 
likely  she  had  wriggled  into  Dorothy's  Suffrage  meeting 
on  purpose.     She  was  capable  of  anything. 

Not  that  Vera  thought  there  was  any  need  for  Frances 
to  worry.  It  was  most  unlikely  that  Desmond's  business 
with  Nicky  could  be  serious.  For  one  thing  she  was  too 
young  herself  to  care  for  anybody  as  young  as  Nicky. 
For  another  she  happened  to  be  in  the  beginning,  or  the 
middle,  certainly  nowhere  near  the  end  of  a  tremendous 
affair  with  Headley  Richards.  As  she  was  designing  the 
dresses  and  the  scenery  for  the  new  play  he  was  putting 
on  at  the  Independent  Theatre,  Vera  argued  very  plausibly 
that  the  affair  had  only  just  started,  and  that  Frances  must 
allow  it  a  certain  time  to  run. 

"  I  hope  to  goodness  that  the  Richards  man  will  marry 
her." 

"  My  dear,  how  can  he  ?  He's  married  already  to  a 
nice  little  woman  that  he  isn't  half  tired  of  yet.  Desmond 
was  determined  to  have  him  and  she's  got  him;  but  he's 
only  taken  her  in  his  stride,  as  you  may  say.  I  don't  sup- 
pose he  cares  very  much  one  way  or  another.  But  with 
Desmond  it's  a  point  of  honour." 

"  What's  a  point  of  honour  ?  " 

"  Why,  to  have  him.  Not  to  be  left  out.  Besides,  she 
always  said  she  could  take  him  from  poor  little  Ginny 
Richards,  and  she's  done  it.  That  was  another  point  of 
honour." 

With  a  calmness  that  was  horrible  to  Frances  Vera 
weighed  her  friend  Desmond's  case.  To  Frances  it  was  as 
if  she  had  never  known  Vera.  Either  Vera  had  changed 
or  she  had  never  known  her.     She  had  never  known 


i58  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

women,  or  men  either,  who  discussed  such  performances 
with  calmness.  Vera  herself  hadn't  made  her  infidelities  a 
point  of  honour. 

These  were  the  passions  and  the  thoughts  of  Lawrence 
Stephen's  and  of  Desmond's  world;  these  were  the  things 
it  took  for  granted.  These  people  lived  in  a  moral  vor- 
tex; they  whirled  round  and  round  with  each  other;  they 
were  powerless  to  resist  the  swirl.  Not  one  of  them  had 
any  other  care  then  to  love  and  to  make  love  after  the 
manner  of  the  Vortex.  This  was  their  honour,  not  to  be 
left  out  of  it,  not  to  be  left  out  of  the  vortex,  but  to  be 
carried  away,  to  be  sucked  in,  and  whirl  round  and  round 
with  each  other  and  the  rest. 

The  painter  girl  Desmond  was  horrible  to  Frances. 

And  all  the  time  her  mind  was  busy  with  one  question : 
"  Do  you  think  Nicky  knows  ?  " 

"  I'm  perfectly  sure  he  doesn't." 

"  Perhaps  —  if  he  did  — " 

"  No,  my  dear,  that's  no  good.  If  you  tell  him  he  won't 
believe  it.  You'll  have  all  his  chivalry  up  in  arms.  And 
you'll  be  putting  into  his  head  what  may  never  come  into 
it  if  he's  left  alone.  And  you'll  be  putting  it  into  Des- 
mond's head." 


Captain  Drayton,  whom  Anthony  consulted,  said, 
"  Leave  him  alone."  Those  painting  and  writing  john- 
nies were  a  rum  lot.  You  couldn't  take  them  seriously. 
The  Desmond  girl  might  be  everything  that  Vera  Harri- 
son said  she  was.  He  didn't  think,  though,  that  the  idea 
of  making  love  to  her  would  enter  Nicky's  head  if  they  left 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  159 

him  alone.     Nicky's  I  cad  had  more  important  ideas  in  it. 
So  they  left  him  alone. 


And  at  first  Nicholas  really  was  too  busy  to  think  much 
of  Desmond.  Too  busy  with  his  assistant  manager's  job 
at  the  Morss  Motor  Works;  too  busy  with  one  of  the 
little  ideas  to  which  he  owed  the  sudden  rise  in  his 
position :  the  little  idea  of  making  the  Morss  cars  go  faster ; 
too  busy  with  his  big  Idea  which  had  nothing  whatever 
to  do  with  the  Morss  Company  and  their  cars. 

His  big  Idea  was  the  idea  of  the  Moving  Fortress.  The 
dream  of  a  French  engineer,  the  old,  abandoned  dream  of 
the  forteresse  mobile,  had  become  Nicky's  passion.  He 
claimed  no  originality  for  his  idea.  It  was  a  composite 
of  the  amoured  train,  the  revolving  turret,  the  tractor 
with  caterpillar  wheels  and  the  motor-car.  These  things 
had  welded  themselves  together  gradually  in  Nicky's  mind 
during  his  last  year  at  Cambridge.  The  table  in  Nicky's 
sitting-room  at  the  top  of  the  house  in  Chelsea  was  now 
covered  with  the  parts  of  his  model  of  the  Moving  For- 
tress. He  made  them  at  the  Works,  one  by  one ;  for  the 
Morss  Company  were  proud  of  him,  and  he  had  leave 
to  use  their  material  and  plant  now  and  then  for  little 
ideas  of  his  own.  The  idea  of  the  Moving  Fortress  was 
with  him  all  day  in  the  workshops  and  offices  and  show- 
rooms, hovering  like  a  formless  spiritual  presence  among 
the  wheeled  forms.  But  in  the  evening  it  took  shape  and 
sound.  It  arose  and  moved,  after  its  fashion,  as  he  had 
conceived  it,  beautiful,  monstrous,  terrible.  At  night, 
beside  the  image  of  the  forteresse  mobile,  the  image  of 


160  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Desmond  was  a  thin  ghost  that  stood  back,  mournful  and 
dumb,  in  the  right-hand  corner  of  the  vision. 

But  the  image  of  Desmond  was  there. 

At  first  it  stood  for  Nicky's  predominant  anxiety :  "  I 
wonder  when  Desmond  will  have  finished  the  drawings." 

The  model  of  the  Moving  Fortress  waited  upon  Des- 
mond's caprice. 

The  plans  of  the  parts  and  sections  had  to  be  finished 
before  these  could  be  fitted  together  and  the  permanent 
model  of  the  Moving  Portress  set  up.  The  Moving  Tor- 
tress  itself  waited  upon  Desmond. 

For,  though  Nicky  could  make  and  build  his  engine,  he 
could  not  draw  his  plans  properly ;  and  he  could  not  trust 
anybody  who  understood  engines  to  draw  them.  He  was 
haunted,  almost  insanely,  by  the  fear  that  somebody  else 
would  hit  upon  the  idea  of  the  Moving  Fortress ;  it  seemed 
to  him  so  obvious  that  no  gunner  and  no  engineer  could 
miss  it.  And  the  drawings  Desmond  made  for  him,  the 
drawings  in  black  and  white,  the  drawings  in  grey  wash, 
and  the  coloured  drawings  were  perfect.  Nicky,  unskilled 
in  everything  but  the  inventing  and  building  up  of  engines, 
did  not  know  how  perfect  the  drawings  were,  any  more 
than  he  knew  the  value  of  the  extraordinary  pictures  that 
hung  on  the  walls  and  stood  on  the  easels  in  her  studio; 
but  he  did  know  that,  from  the  moment  when  he  took 
Desmond  into  his  adventure,  he  and  his  Idea  were  de- 
pendent on  her. 

He  didn't  care.  He  liked  Desmond.  He  couldn't  help 
it  if  Drayton  disapproved  of  her  and  if  Dorothy  didn't 
like  her.  She  was,  he  said  to  himself,  a  ripping  good 
sort.     She    might    be    frightfully    clever;    Nicky    rather 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  161 

thought  she  was ;  but  she  never  let  you  feel  it ;  she  never 
talked  that  revolting  rot  that  Rosalind  and  Dorothy's  other 
friends  talked.     She  let  you  think. 

It  was  Desmond  who  told  him  that  his  sister  didn't  like 
her  and  that  Frank  Drayton  disapproved  of  her. 

"  They  wouldn't,"  said  Nicky,  "  if  they  knew  you." 
And  he  turned  again  to  the  subject  of  his  Moving  Fortress. 

For  Desmond's  intelligence  was  perfect,  and  her  sym- 
pathy was  perfect,  and  her  way  of  listening  was  perfect. 
She  sat  on  the  floor,  on  the  orange  and  blue  cushions,  in 
silence  and  in  patience,  embracing  her  knees  with  her  long, 
slender,  sallow-white  arms,  while  Nicky  stamped  up  and 
down  her  studio  and  talked  to  her,  like  a  monomaniac, 
about  his  Moving  Fortress.  It  didn't  bore  her  to  listen, 
because  she  didn't  have  to  answer ;  she  had  only  to  look  at 
him  and  smile,  and  nod  her  head  at  him  now  and  then  as 
a  sign  of  enthusiasm.  She  liked  looking  at  him ;  she  liked 
his  young  naivete  and  monomania ;  she  liked  his  face  and 
all  his  gestures,  and  the  poise  and  movement  of  his  young 
body. 

And  as  she  looked  at  him  the  beauty  that  slept  in  her 
dulled  eyes  and  in  her  sallow-white  face  and  in  her  thin 
body  awoke  and  became  alive.  It  was  not  dangerous 
yet ;  not  ready  yet  to  tell  the  secret  held  back  in  its  long, 
subtle,  serious,  and  slender  lines.  Desmond's  sensuality 
was  woven  with  so  fine  a  web  that  you  would  have  said  it 
belonged  less  to  her  body  than  to  her  spirit  and  her  mind. 


In  nineteen-eleven,  on  fine  days  in  the  late  spring  and 
early  summer,  when  the  Morss  Company  lent  him  a  car, 


1 62  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

or  when  they  sent  him  motoring  about  the  country  on  their 
business,  he  took  Desmond  with  him  and  Desmond's  paint- 
ing box  and  easel.  And  they  rested  on  the  grass  borders 
of  the  high  roads  and  on  the  edges  of  the  woods  and  moors, 
and  Desmond  painted  her  extraordinary  pictures  while 
Nicky  lay  on  his  back  beside  her  with  his  face  turned  up 
to  the  sky  and  dreamed  of  flying  machines. 

For  he  had  done  with  his  Moving  Fortress.  It  only 
waited  for  Desmond  to  finish  the  last  drawing. 

When  he  had  that  he  would  show  the  plans  and  the 
model  to  Frank  Drayton  before  he  sent  them  to  the  War 
Office. 

He  lived  for  that  moment  of  completion. 


And  from  the  autumn  of  nineteen-ten  to  the  spring  of 
nineteen-eleven  Desmond's  affair  with  Headley  Richards 
increased  and  flowered  and  ripened  to  its  fulfilment.  And 
in  the  early  summer  she  found  that  things  had  happened 
as  she  had  meant  that  they  should  happen. 

She  had  always  meant  it.  She  had  always  said,  and 
she  had  always  thought  that  women  were  no  good  unless 
they  had  the  courage  of  their  opinions ;  the  only  thing  to 
be  ashamed  of  was  the  cowardice  that  prevented  them  from 
getting  what  they  wanted. 

Desmond  had  no  idea  that  the  violence  of  the  Vortex  had 
sucked  her  in.  Being  in  the  movement  of  her  own  free 
will,  she  thought  that  by  simply  spinning  round  faster  and 
faster  she  added  her  own  energy  to  the  whirl.  It  was  not 
Dorothy's  vortex,  or  the  vortex  of  the  fighting  Suffrage 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  163 

woman.  Desmond  didn't  care  very  much  about  the  Suf- 
frage; or  about  any  kind  of  freedom  but  her  own  kind; 
or  about  anybody's  freedom  but  her  own.  Maud  Black- 
adder's  idea  of  freedom  struck  Desmond  as  sheer  moral 
and  physical  insanity.  Yet  each,  Desmond  and  Dorothy 
and  Maud  Blackadder  and  Mrs.  Blathwaite  and  her 
daughter  and  Mrs.  Palmerston-Swete,  had  her  own  par- 
ticular swirl  in  the  immense  Vortex  of  the  young  century. 
If  you  had  youth  and  life  in  you,  you  were  in  revolt. 

Desmond's  theories  were  Dorothy's  theories  too;  only 
that  while  Dorothy,  as  Rosalind  had  said,  thought  out 
her  theories  in  her  brain  without  feeling  them,  Desmond 
felt  them  with  her  whole  being ;  and  with  her  whole  being, 
secret,  subtle  and  absolutely  relentless,  she  was  bent  on 
carrying  them  out. 

And  in  the  summer,  in  the  new  season,  Headley  Rich- 
ards decided  that  he  had  no  further  use  for  Desmond. 
The  new  play  had  run  its  course  at  the  Independent 
Theatre,  a  course  so  brief  that  Richards  had  been  dis- 
appointed. He  put  down  the  failure  mainly  to  the  queer- 
ness  of  the  dresses  and  the  scenery  she  had  designed  for 
him.  Desmond's  new  art  was  too  new;  people  weren't 
ready  yet  for  that  sort  of  thing.  At  the  same  time  he 
discovered  that  he  was  really  very  much  attached  to  his 
own  wife  Ginny,  and  when  Ginny  nobly  offered  to  give 
him  his  divorce  he  had  replied  nobly  that  he  didn't  want 
one.     And  he  left  Desmond  to  face  the  music. 

Desmond's  misery  was  acute ;  but  it  was  not  so  hopeless 
as  it  would  have  been  if  she  could  have  credited  Ginny 
Richards  with  any  permanent  power  of  attraction  for 
Headley.     She  knew  he  would  come  back  to  her.     She 


1 64  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

knew  the  power  of  her  own  body.  She  held  him  by  the 
tie  that  was  never  broken  so  long  as  it  endured.  He  would 
never  marry  her;  yet  he  would  come  back. 

But  in  the  interval  between  these  acts  there  was  the 
music. 

And  the  first  sound  of  the  music,  the  changed  intona- 
tions of  her  landlady,  frightened  Desmond ;  for  though  she 
was  older  than  Nicky  she  was  very  young.  And  there 
were  Desmond's  people.  You  may  forget  that  you  have 
people  and  behave  as  if  they  weren't  there;  but,  if  they 
are  there,  sooner  or  later  they  will  let  you  know  it.  An 
immense  volume  of  sound  and  some  terrifying  orchestral 
effects  were  contributed  by  Desmond's  people.  So  that 
the  music  was  really  very  bad  to  bear. 

Desmond  couldn't  bear  it.  And  in  her  fright  she 
thought  of  Nicky. 

She  knew  that  she  hadn't  a  chance  so  long  as  he  was  ab- 
sorbed in  the  Moving  Fortress.  But  the  model  was  fin- 
ished and  set  up  and  she  was  at  work  on  the  last  drawing. 
And  no  more  ideas  for  engines  were  coming  into  Nicky's 
head.  The  Morss  Company  and  Nicky  himself  were  even 
beginning  to  wonder  whether  there  ever  would  be  any 
more. 

Then  Nicky  thought  of  Desmond.  And  he  showed  that 
he  was  thinking  of  her  by  sitting  still  and  not  talking 
when  he  was  with  her.  She  did  not  fill  that  emptiness  and 
spaciousness  of  Nicky's  head,  but  he  couldn't  get  her  out 
of  it. 


When  Vera  noticed  the  silence  of  the  two  she  became 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  165 

uneasy,  and  judged  that  the  time  had  come  for  discreet 
intervention. 

"  Nicky,"  she  said,  "  is  it  true  that  Desmond's  been 
doing  drawings  for  you  ?  " 

"  Yes,"  said  Nicky,  "  she's  done  any  amount." 

"  My  dear  boy,  have  you  any  idea  of  the  amount  you'll 
have  to  pay  her  ?  " 

"  I  haven't,"  said  Nicky,  "  I  wish  I  had.  I  hate  ask- 
ing her,  and  yet  I  suppose  I'll  have  to." 

"  Of  course  you'll  have  to.  She  won't  hate  it.  She's 
got  to  earn  her  living  as  much  as  you  have." 

"  Has  she  ?     You  don't  mean  to  say  she's  hard  up  ?  " 

He  had  never  thought  of  Desmond  as  earning  her  own 
living,  still  less  as  being  hard  up. 

"  I  only  wish  she  were,"  said  Vera,  "  for  your  sake." 

"  Why  on  earth  for  my  sake  ?  " 

"  Because  then,  my  dear  Nicky,  you  wouldn't  have  to 
pay  so  stiff  a  price." 

"  I  don't  care,"  said  Nicky,  "  how  stiff  the  price  is.  I 
shall  pay  it." 

And  Vera  replied  that  Desmond,  in  her  own  queer  way, 
really  was  a  rather  distinguished  painter.  "  Pay  her," 
she  said.  "  Pay  her  for  goodness  sake  and  have  done  with 
it.     And  if  she  wants  to  give  you  things  don't  let  her." 

"  As  if,"  said  Nicky,  "  I  should  dream  of  letting  her." 

And  he  went  off  to  Chelsea  to  pay  Desmond  then  and 
there. 

Vera  thought  that  she  had  been  rather  clever.  Nicky 
would  dash  in  and  do  the  thing  badly.  He  would  be  very 
proud  about  it,  and  he  would  revolt  from  his  de- 
pendence on  Desmond,  and  he  would  show  her  —  Vera 


1 66  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

hoped  that  he  would  show  her  —  that  he  did  not  want  to 
be  under  any  obligation  to  her.  And  Desmond  would  be 
hurt  and  lose  her  temper.  The  hard  look  would  get  into 
her  face  and  destroy  its  beauty,  and  she  would  say  de- 
testable things  in  a  detestable  voice,  and  a  dreadful  ugli- 
ness would  come  between  them,  and  the  impulse  of  Nicky's 
yet  unborn  passion  would  be  checked,  and  the  memory  of 
that  abominable  half-hour  would  divide  them  for  ever. 


But  Vera  herself  had  grown  hard  and  clever.  She  had 
forgotten  Nicky's  tenderness,  and  she  knew  nothing  at 
all  about  Desmond's  fright.  And,  as  it  happened,  neither 
Nicky  nor  Desmond  did  any  of  the  things  she  thought  they 
would  do. 

Nicky  was  not  impetuous.  He  found  Desmond  in  her 
studio  working  on  the  last  drawing  of  the  Moving  Fortress, 
with  the  finished  model  before  her.  That  gave  him  his 
opening,  and  he  approached  shyly  and  tentatively. 

Desmond  put  on  an  air  of  complete  absorption  in  her 
drawing;  but  she  smiled.  A  pretty  smile  that  lifted  the 
corners  of  her  mouth  and  made  it  quiver,  and  gave  Nicky 
a  queer  and  unexpected  desire  to  kiss  her. 

He  went  on  wanting  to  know  what  his  debt  was  —  not 
that  he  could  ever  really  pay  it. 

"  Oh,  you  foolish  Nicky,"  Desmond  said. 

Fie  repeated  himself  over  and  over  again,  and  each 
time  she  had  an  answer,  and  the  answers  had  a  cumulative 
effect. 

"  There  isn't  any  debt.     You  don't  pay  anything  — " 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  167 

"  I  didn't  do  it  for  that,  you  silly  boy." 

"What  did  I  do  it  for?  I  did  it  for  fun.  You 
couldn't  draw  a  thing  like  that  for  anything  else.  Look 
at  it  — " 

— "  Well,  if  you  want  to  be  horrid  and  calculating  about 
it,  think  of  the  lunches  and  the  dinners  and  the  theatre 
tickets  and  the  flowers  you've  given  me.  Oh,  and  the  gal- 
lons and  gallons  of  petrol.  How  am  I  ever  to  pay  you 
back  again  ?  " 

Thus  she  mocked  him. 

"  Can't  you  see  how  you're  spoiling  it  all  ?  " 

And  then,  passionately:  "  Oh,  Nicky,  please  don't  say 
it  again.     It  hurts." 

She  turned  on  him  her  big  black  looking-glass  eyes 
washed  bright,  each  with  one  tear  that  knew  better  than  to 
fall  just  yet.  He  must  see  that  she  was  holding  herself 
well  in  hand.  It  would  be  no  use  letting  herself  go  until 
he  had  forgotten  his  Moving  Fortress.  He  was  looking 
at  the  beastly  thing  now,  instead  of  looking  at  her. 

"  Are  you  thinking  of  another  old  engine  ?  " 

"  No,"  said  Nicky.     "  I'm  not  thinking  of  anything." 

"  Then  you  don't  want  me  to  do  any  more  drawings  %  " 

"  No." 

"  Well  then  —  I  wonder  whether  you'd  very  much  mind 
going  away  ?  " 

"Now?" 

"  No.  Not  now.  But  soon.  From  here.  Alto- 
gether." 

"Go?     Altogether?     Me?     Why?" 

He  was  utterly  astonished.  He  thought  that  he  had 
offended  Desmond  past  all  forgiveness. 


1 68  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Because  I  came  here  to  be  alone.  To  work.  And  I 
can't  work.     And  I  want  to  be  alone  again." 

"  Am  I  —  spoiling  it  ?  " 

"  Yes.     You're  spoiling  it  damnably." 

"  I'm  sorry,  Desmond.  I  didn't  mean  to.  I 
thought  — "  But  he  hadn't  the  heart  to  say  what  he  had 
thought. 

She  looked  at  him  and  knew  that  the  moment  was 
coming. 

It  had  come. 

She  turned  away  from  the  table  where  the  Moving 
Fortress  stood,  threatening  her  with  its  mimic  guns,  and 
reminding  Nicky  of  the  things  she  most  wanted  him  to 
forget.  She  withdrew  to  her  crouching  place  at  the  other 
end  of  the  studio,  among  the  cushions. 

He  followed  her  there  with  slow,  thoughtful  steps, 
steps  full  of  brooding  purpose  and  of  half-unconscious 
meaning. 

"  Nicky,  I'm  so  unhappy.  I  didn't  know  it  was  possi- 
ble for  anybody  to  be  so  unhappy  in  this  world." 

She  began  to  cry  quietly. 

"  Desmond  —  what  is  it  ?  What  is  it  ?  Tell  me. 
Why  can't  you  tell  me  ?  " 


She  thought,  "  It  will  be  all  right  if  he  kisses  me  once. 
If  he  holds  me  in  his  arms  once.     Then  I  can  tell  him." 

For  then  he  would  know  that  he  loved  her.  He  was 
not  quite  sure  now.  She  knew  that  he  was  not  quite 
sure.  She  trusted  to  the  power  of  her  body  to  make 
him  sure. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  169 

Her  youth  neither  understood  his  youth,  nor  allowed  for 
it,  nor  pitied  it. 

He  had  kissed  her.  He  had  held  her  in  his  arms  and 
kissed  her  more  than  once  while  she  cried  there,  hiding  her 
face  in  the  hollow  of  his  arm.  She  was  weak  and  small. 
She  was  like  some  small,  soft,  helpless  animal  and  she 
was  hurt.  Her  sobbing  and  panting  made  her  ribs  feel 
fragile  like  the  ribs  of  some  small,  soft,  helpless  animal 
under  the  pressure  of  his  arms.     And  she  was  frightened. 

He  couldn't  stand  the  sight  of  suffering.  He  had  never 
yet  resisted  the  appeal  of  small,  weak,  helpless  things  in 
fright  and  pain.  He  could  feel  Desmond's  heart  going 
thump,  thump,  under  the  blue  thing  he  called  her  pina- 
fore.    Her  heart  hurt  him  with  its  thumping. 

And  through  all  his  painful  pity  he  knew  that  her 
skin  was  smooth  and  sweet  like  a  sallow-white  rose-leaf. 
And  Desmond  knew  that  he  knew  it.  His  mouth  slid 
with  an  exquisite  slipperiness  over  the  long,  polished 
bands  of  her  black  hair ;  and  he  thought  that  he  loved  her. 
Desmond  knew  that  he  thought  it. 

And  still  she  waited.  She  said  to  herself,  "  It's  no 
good  his  thinking  it.  I  daren't  tell  him  till  he  says  it. 
Till  he  asks  me  to  marry  him." 


He  had  said  it  at  last.  And  he  had  asked  her  to  marry 
him.     And  then  she  had  told  him. 

And  all  that  he  said  was,  "  I  don't  care."  He  said  it 
to  Desmond,  and  he  said  it  to  himself. 

The  funny  thing  was  that  he  did  not  care.  He  was  as 
miserable  as  it  was  well  possible  to  be,  but  he  didn't  really 


170  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

care.  He  was  not  even  surprised.  It  was  as  if  the  knowl- 
edge of  it  had  been  hiding  in  the  back  of  his  head  behind 
all  the  ideas. 

And  yet  he  couldn't  have  known  it  all  the  time.  Either 
it  must  have  gone  away  when  his  ideas  went,  or  he 
must  have  been  trying  not  to  see  it. 

She  had  slipped  from  his  arms  and  stood  before  him, 
dabbing  her  mouth  and  eyes  now  and  then  with  her 
pocket-handkerchief,   controlling  herself,   crying   quietly. 

She  knew,  what  had  not  dawned  on  Nicky  yet,  that  he 
didn't  love  her.  If  he  had  loved  her  he  would  have  cared 
intolerably.  He  didn't  care  about  Headley  Richards  be- 
cause he  didn't  care  about  Desmond  any  more.  He  was 
only  puzzled. 

"Why  did  you  do  it?" 

"  I  can't  think  why.  I  must  have  been  off  my  head. 
I  didn't  know  what  it  was  like.  I  didn't  know.  I 
thought  it  would  be  wonderful  and  beautiful.  I  thought 
he  was  wonderful  and  beautiful." 

"  Poor  little  Desmond." 

"  Oh,  Nicky,  do  you  think  me  a  beast  ?  Does  it  make 
you  hate  me?" 

"  No.  Of  course  it  doesn't.  The  only  awful  thing 
is—" 

"What?     Tell  me." 

"Well  — you  see—" 

"  You  mean  the  baby  ?  I  know  it's  awful.  You 
needn't  tell  me  that,  Nicky." 

He  stared  at  her. 

"  I  mean  it's  so  awful  for  it." 

She  thought  he  had  been  thinking  of  himseli  and  her. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  171 

"Why  should  it  be?" 

"  Why  ?  There  isn't  any  why.  It  just  is.  I  know 
it  is." 

He  was  thinking  of  Veronica. 

"  You  see,"  he  said  simply,  "  that's  why  this  sort  of 
thing  is  such  a  rotten  game.  It's  so  hard  on  the  kiddy. 
I  suppose  you  didn't  think  of  that.  You  couldn't  have, 
or  else  you  wouldn't  — " 

He  paused.  There  was  one  thing  he  had  to  know.  He 
must  get  it  out  of  her. 

"  It  hasn't  made  you  feel  that  you  don't  want  it  ?  " 

"Oh  —  I  don't  know  what  I  want  —  now.  I  don't 
know  what  it  makes  me  feel !  " 

"Don't  let  it,  Desmond.  Don't  let  it.  It'll  be  all 
right.  You  won't  feel  like  that  when  you've  married 
me.  Can't  you  see  that  that's  the  wonderful  and  beauti- 
ful part?" 

"  What  is  ? "  she  said  in  her  tired  drawl. 

"  It  —  the  poor  kiddy." 

Because  he  remembered  Veronica  he  was  going  to  marry 
Desmond. 


Veronica's  mother  was  the  first  to  hear  about  it.  Des- 
mond told  her. 

Veronica's  mother  was  determined  to  stop  it  for  the 
sake  of  everybody  concerned. 

She  wrote  to  Nicholas  and  asked  him  to  come  and  dine 
with  her  one  evening  when  Lawrence  Stephen  was  dining 
somewhere  else.  (Lawrence  Stephen  made  rather  a  point 
of  not  going  to  houses  where  Vera  was  not  received;  but 


i72  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

sometimes,  when  the  occasion  was  political,  or  otherwise 
important,  he  had  to.  That  was  her  punishment,  as 
Bartholomew  had  meant  that  it  should  he.) 

Nicky  knew  what  he  had  been  sent  for,  and  to  all  his 
aunt's  assaults  and  manoeuvres  he  presented  an  inexpug- 
nable front. 

"  You  mustn't  do  it ;  you  simply  mustn't." 

He  intimated  that  his  marriage  was  his  own  affair. 

"  It  isn't.  It's  the  affair  of  everybody  who  cares  for 
you." 

"  Their  caring  isn't  my  affair,"  said  Nicky. 

And  then  Vera  began  to  say  things  about  Desmond. 

"  It's  absurd  of  you,"  she  said,  "  to  treat  her  as  if  she 
was  an  innocent  child.  She  isn't  a  child,  and  she  isn't 
innocent.  She  knew  perfectly  well  what  she  was  about. 
There's  nothing  she  doesn't  know.  She  meant  it  to  hap- 
pen, and  she  made  it  happen.  She  said  she  would.  She 
meant  you  to  marry  her,  and  she's  making  you  marry  her. 
I  daresay  she  said  she  would.  She's  as  clever  and  de- 
termined as  the  devil.  Neither  you  nor  Headley  Richards 
ever  had  a  chance  against  her." 

"  She  hasn't  got  a  dog's  chance  against  all  you  peo- 
ple yelping  at  her  now  she's  down.  I  should  have 
thought  — " 

"  You  mean  I've  no  business  to?  That  was  different. 
I  didn't  take  any  other  woman's  husband,  or  any  other 
woman's  lover,  Nicky." 

"  If  you  had,"  said  Nicky,  "  I  wouldn't  have  inter- 
fered." 

"  I  wouldn't  interfere  if  I  thought  you  cared  that  for 
Desmond.     But  you  don't.     You  know  you  don't." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  173 

"  Of  course  I  care  for  her." 

He  said  it  stoutly,  but  he  coloured  all  the  same,  and 
Vera  knew  that  he  was  vulnerable. 

"  Oh,  Xicky  dear,  if  you'd  only  waited  — " 

"  What  do  you  mean  ?  " 

His  young  eyes  interrogated  her  austerely;  and  she 
flinched.  "  I  don't  know  what  I  mean.  Unless  I  mean 
that  you're  just  a  little  young  to  marry  anybody." 

"  I  don't  care  if  I  am.  I  don't  feel  young,  I  can  tell 
you.     Anyhow  Desmond's  years  younger." 

"  Desmond  is  twenty-three.  You're  twenty.  It's 
Veronica  who's  years  younger." 

"  Veronica  ?  " 

"  She's  sixteen.  You  don't  imagine  Desmond  is  as 
young  as  that,  do  you?  Wait  till  she's  twenty-five  and 
you're  twenty-two." 

"  It  wouldn't  do  poor  Desmond  much  good  if  I  did. 
I  could  kill  Headley  Richards." 

"What  for?" 

"  For  leaving  her." 

Vera  smiled.  "  That  shows  how  much  you  care.  You 
wouldn't  have  felt  like  killing  him  if  he'd  stuck  to  her. 
Why  should  you  marry  Headley  Richards'  mistress  and 
take  on  his  child?     It's  preposterous." 

"  It  isn't.  If  the  other  fellow's  a  brute  it's  all  the 
more  reason  why  I  shouldn't  be.  I  want  to  be  some  use 
in  this  rotten  world  where  people  are  so  damnably  cruel 
to  each  other.  And  there's  that  unhappy  kiddy.  You've 
forgotten  the  kiddy." 

"  Do  you  mean  to  say  it's  Desmond's  child  you're  think- 
ing of  ?  " 


i74  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  I  can't  understand  any  woman  not  thinking  of  it," 
said  Nicky. 

He  looked  at  her,  and  she  knew  that  he  remembered 
Veronica. 

Then  she  gave  him  back  his  own  with  interest,  for  his 
good. 

"  If  you  care  so  much,  why  don't  you  choose  a  better 
mother  for  your  own  children  ?  " 

It  was  as  if  she  said :  "  If  you  care  so  much  about 
Veronica,  why  don't  you  marry  her?  " 

"  It's  a  bit  too  late  to  think  of  that  now,"  said  poor 
Nicky. 

Because  he  had  cared  so  much  about  Veronica  he  was 
going  to  marry  Desmond. 


"  I  couldn't  do  anything  with  him,"  Vera  said  after- 
wards. "  Nothing  I  said  made  the  least  impression  on 
him." 

That  however  (as  both  Vera  and  Nicky  were  aware), 
was  not  strictly  true.  But,  in  spite  of  Nicky's  terrible 
capacity  for  remembering,  she  stuck  to  it  that  Desmond's 
affair  would  have  made  no  impression  on  him  if  it  had  not 
been  for  that  other  absurd  affair  of  the  Professor's  wife. 
And  it  would  have  been  better,  Lawrence  Stephen  said, 
for  Nicky  to  have  made  love  to  all  the  married  women  in 
Cambridge  than  for  him  to  marry  Phyllis  Desmond. 

These  reflections  were  forced  on  them  by  the  ironic 
coincidence  of  Nicky's  engagement  with  his  rehabilitation 
at  the  University. 

Drayton's     forecast     was     correct;     Nicky's     brother 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  175 

Michael  had  not  been  removed  from  Nicky's  College  eight 
months  before  letters  of  apology  and   restitution  came. 
But  both  apology  and  restitution  came  too  late. 
For  by  that  time  Nicky  had  married  Desmond. 


XIV 

After  Nicholas,  Veronica ;  and  after  Veronica, 
Michael. 

Anthony  and  Frances  sat  in  the  beautiful  drawing-room 
of  their  house,  one  on  each  side  of  the  fireplace.  They 
had  it  all  to  themselves,  except  for  the  cats,  Tito  and 
Timmy,  who  crouched  on  the  hearthrug  at  their  feet. 
Frances's  forehead  and  her  upper  lip  were  marked  deli- 
cately with  shallow,  tender  lines;  Anthony's  eyes  had 
crow's-feet  at  their  corners,  pointing  to  grey  hairs  at  his 
temples.  To  each  other  their  faces  were  as  they  had 
been  fifteen  years  ago.  The  flight  of  time  was  measured 
for  them  by  the  generations  of  the  cats  that  had  succeeded 
Jane  and  Jerry.  For  still  in  secret  they  refused  to  think 
of  their  children  as  grown-up. 

Dorothy  was  upstairs  in  her  study  writing  articles  for 
the  Women's  Franchise  Union.  They  owed  it  to  her 
magnanimity  that  they  had  one  child  remaining  with 
them  in  the  house.  John  was  at  Cheltenham ;  Veronica 
was  in  Dresden.  Michael  was  in  Germany,  too,  at  that 
School  of  Forestry  at  Aschaffenburg  which  Anthony  had 
meant  for  Nicky.  They  couldn't  bear  to  think  where 
Nicky  was. 

When  Frances  thought  about  her  children  now  her  mind 
went  backwards.  If  only  they  hadn't  grown-up;  if  only 
they  could  have  stayed  little  for  ever !  In  another  four 
years  even  Don-Don  would  be  grown-up  —  Don-Don  who 

176 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  177 

was  such  a  long  time  getting  older  that  at  fourteen,  only 
two  years  ago,  he  had  been  capable  of  sitting  in  her  lap, 
a  great  long-legged,  numbering  puppy,  while  mother  and 
son  rocked  dangerously  together  in  each  other's  arms,  like 
two  children,  laughing  together,   mocking  each  other. 

She  was  going  to  be  wiser  with  Don-Don  than  she  had 
been  with  Nicky.  She  would  be  wiser  with  Michael  when 
he  came  back  from  Germany.  She  would  keep  them  both 
out  of  the  Vortex,  the  horrible  Vortex  that  Lawrence 
Stephen  and  Vera  had  let  Nicky  in  for,  the  Vortex  that 
seized  on  youth  and  forced  it  into  a  corrupt  maturity. 
After  Desmond's  affair  Anthony  and  Frances  felt  that 
to  them  the  social  circle  inhabited  by  Vera  and  Lawrence 
Stephen  would  never  be  anything  but  a  dirty  hell. 

As  for  Veronica,  the  longer  she  stayed  in  Germany 
the  better. 

Yet  Frances  knew  that  they  had  not  sent  Veronica  to 
Dresden  to  prevent  her  mother  from  getting  hold  of  her. 
When  she  remembered  the  fear  she  had  had  of  the  apple- 
tree  house,  she  said  to  herself  that  Desmond  was  a  judg- 
ment on  her  for  sending  little  Veronica  away. 

And  yet  it  was  the  kindest  thing  they  could  have  done 
for  her.  Veronica  was  happy  in  Dresden,  living  with  a 
German  family  and  studying  music  and  the  language. 
She  had  no  idea  that  music  and  the  language  were  mere 
blinds,  and  that  she  had  been  sent  to  the  German  family 
to  keep  her  out  of  Nicky's  way. 

They  would  have  them  all  back  again  at  Christmas. 
Frances  counted  the  days.  From  to-night,  the  seventh  of 
June,  to  December  the  twentieth  was  not  much  more  than 
six  months. 


178  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

To-night,  the  seventh  of  June,  was  Nicky's  wedding- 
night.  But  they  did  not  know  that.  Nicky  had  kept  the 
knowledge  from  them,  in  his  mercy,  to  save  them  the  agony 
of  deciding  whether  they  would  recognize  the  marriage  or 
not  And  as  neither  Frances  nor  Anthony  had  ever  faced 
squarely  the  prospect  of  disaster  to  their  children,  they 
had  turned  their  backs  on  Nicky's  marriage  and  sup- 
ported each  other  in  the  hope  that  at  the  last  minute  some- 
thing would  happen  to  prevent  it. 


The  ten  o'clock  post,  and  two  letters  from  Germany. 
Not  from  Michael,  not  from  Veronica.  One  from  Frau 
Schafer,  the  mother  of  the  German  family.  It  was  all 
in  German,  and  neither  Anthony  nor  Frances  could  make 
out  more  than  a  word  here  and  there.  "  Das  siisse,  liebe 
Miidchen  "  meant  Veronica.  But  certain  phrases :  "  trau- 
rige  Nachrichten  "  .  .  .  "  furchtbare  Schwachheit  "... 
".  .  .  eine  entsetzliche  Blutleere  .  .  ."  terrified  them, 
and  they  sent  for  Dorothy  to  translate. 

Dorothy  was  a  good  German  scholar,  but  somehow  she 
was  not  very  fluent.     She  scowled  over  the  letter. 

"  What  does  it  mean  % "  said  Frances.  "  Haemor- 
rhage ?  " 

"  No.  No.  Ana?mia.  Severe  anaemia.  Heart  and 
stomach  trouble." 

"  But  '  traurige  Nachrichten  '  is  '  bad  news.'  They're 
breaking  it  to  us  that  she's  dying." 

(It  was  unbearable  to  think  of  Nicky  marrying  Konny; 
but  it  was  more  unbearable  to  think  of  Ilonny  dying.) 

"  They  don't  say  they're  sending  us  bad  news ;  they  say 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  179 

they  think  Ronny  must  have  had  some.  To  account  for 
her  illness.  Because  they  say  she's  been  so  happy  with 
them." 

"  But  what  bad  news  could  she  have  had  ?  " 
"  Perhaps  she  knows  about  Nicky." 
"  But  nobody's  told  her,  unless  Vera  has." 
"  She  hasn't.     I  know  she  hasn't.     She  didn't  want  her 
to  know." 

"Well,  then—" 

"  Mummy,  you  don't  have  to  tell  Ronny  things.  She 
always  knows  them." 

"  How  on  earth  could  she  know  a  thing  like  that  ?  " 
"  She  might.     She  sort  of  sees  things  —  like  Ferdie. 
She  may  have  seen  him  with  Desmond.     You  can't  tell." 
"  Do  they  say  what  the  doctor  thinks  ?  " 
"  Yes.     He  thinks  it's  worry  and  Heimweh  —  home- 
sickness.    They  want  us  to  send  for  her  and  take  her  back. 
Not  let  her  have  another  term." 

Though  Frances  loved  Veronica  she  was  afraid  of  her 
coming  back.  For  she  was  more  than  ever  convinced 
that  something  would  happen  and  that  Nicky  would  not 
marry  Desmond. 


The  other  letter  was  even  more  difficult  to  translate  or 
to  understand  when  translated. 

The  authorities  at  Aschaffenburg  requested  Herr  Har- 
rison to  remove  his  son  Michael  from  the  School  of  For- 
estry. Michael  after  his  first  few  weeks  had  done  no 
good  at  the  school.  In  view  of  the  expense  to  Herr 
Harrison  involved  in  his  fees  and  maintenance,  they  could 


180  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

not  honestly  advise  his  entering  upon  another  term.  It 
would  only  be  a  deplorable  throwing  away  of  money  on 
a  useless  scheme.  His  son  Michael  had  no  thoroughness, 
no  practical  ability,  and  no  grasp  whatever  of  theoretic 
detail.  From  Herr  Harrison's  point  of  view  this  was  the 
more  regrettable  inasmuch  as  the  young  man  had  colossal 
decision  and  persistence  and  energy  of  his  own.  He  was 
an  indefatigable  dreamer.  Very  likely  —  when  his 
dreams  had  crystallized  —  a  poet.  But  the  idea  Herr 
Harrison  had  had  that  his  son  Michael  would  make  a 
man  of  business,  or  an  expert  in  Forestry,  was  altogether 
fantastic  and  absurd.  And  from  the  desperate  involu- 
tions of  the  final  sentence  Dorothy  disentangled  the  clear 
fact  that  Michael's  personal  charm,  combined  with  his 
hostility  to  discipline,  his  complete  indifference  to  the 
aims  of  the  authorities,  and  his  utter  lack  of  any  sense  of 
responsibility,  made  him  a  dangerous  influence  in  any 
school. 

That  was  the  end  of  Anthony's  plans  for  Michael. 

The  next  morning  Nicky  wired  from  some  village  in 
Sussex :     "  Married  yesterday. —  Nicky." 

After  that  nothing  seemed  to  matter.  With  Nicky  gone 
from  them  they  were  glad  to  have  Michael  back  again. 
Frances  said  they  might  be  thankful  for  one  thing  —  that 
there  wasn't  any  German  Peggy  or  any  German  Desmond 
in  Michael's  problem. 

And  since  both  Michael  and  Veronica  were  to  be  re- 
moved at  once,  the  simplest  arrangement  was  that  he 
should  return  to  Dresden  and  bring  her  back  with  him. 

Frances  had  never  been  afraid  for  Michael. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  181 

Michael  knew  that  he  had  made  havoc  of  his  father's 
plans.  He  couldn't  help  that.  His  affair  was  far  too 
desperate.  And  any  other  man  but  his  father  would 
have  foreseen  that  the  havoc  was  inevitable  and  would  have 
made  no  plans.  He  knew  he  had  been  turned  into  the 
tree-travelling  scheme  that  had  been  meant  for  Nicky, 
because,  though  Nicky  had  slipped  out  of  it,  his  father 
simply  couldn't  bear  to  give  up  his  idea.  And  no  won- 
der, when  the  dear  old  thing  had  so  few  of  them. 

He  had  been  honest  with  his  father  about  it;  every 
bit  as  honest  as  Nicky  had  been.  He  had  wanted  to 
travel  if  he  could  go  to  China  and  Japan,  just  as  Nicky 
had  wanted  to  travel  if  he  could  go  to  places  like  the  West 
Indies  and  the  Himalaya.  And  he  didn't  mind  trying 
to  get  the  trees  in  when  he  was  there.  He  was  even  pre- 
pared to  accept  Germany  and  the  School  for  Forestry  if 
Germany  was  the  only  way  to  China  and  Japan.  But 
he  had  told  his  father  not  to  mind  if  nothing  came  of  it 
at  the  end  of  all  the  travelling.  And  his  father  had  said 
he  would  take  the  risk.  He  preferred  taking  the  risk  to 
giving  up  his  idea. 

And  Michael  had  been  honest  with  himself.  He  had 
told  himself  that  he  too  must  take  some  risks,  and  the 
chances  were  that  a  year  or  two  in  Germany  wouldn't 
really  hurt  him.  Things  never  did  hurt  you  as  much  as 
you  thought  they  would.  He  had  thought  that  Cambridge 
would  do  all  sorts  of  things  to  him,  and  Cambridge  had 
not  done  anything  to  him  at  all.  As  for  Oxford,  it  had 
given  him  nearly  all  the  solitude  and  liberty  he  wanted, 
and  more  companionship  than  he  was  ever  likely  to  want. 


182 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 


At  twenty-two  Michael  was  no  longer  afraid  of  dying  be- 
fore he  had  finished  his  best  work.  In  spite  of  both  Uni- 
versities he  had  done  more  or  less  what  he  had  meant 
to  do  before  he  went  to  Germany.  His  work  had  not  yet 
stood  the  test  of  time,  but  to  make  up  for  that  he  him- 
self, in  his  uneasy  passion  for  perfection,  like  Time,  de- 
stroyed almost  as  much  as  he  created.  Still,  after  some 
pitiless  eliminations,  enough  of  his  verse  remained  for 
one  fine,  thin  book. 

It  would  be  published  if  Lawrence  Stephen  approved 
of  the  selection. 

So,  Michael  argued,  even  if  he  died  to-morrow  there 
was  no  reason  why  he  should  not  go  to  Germany  to-day. 

He  was  too  young  to  know  that  he  acquiesced  so  calmly 
because  his  soul  was  for  a  moment  appeased  by  accom- 
plishment. 

He  was  too  young  to  know  that  his  soul  had  a  delicate, 
profound  and  hidden  life  of  its  own,  and  that  in  secret 
it  approached  the  crisis  of  transition.  It  was  passing 
over  from  youth  to  maturity,  like  a  sleep-walker,  uncon- 
scious, enchanted,  seeing  its  way  without  seeing  it,  safe 
only  from  the  dangers  of  the  passage  if  nobody  touched 
it,  and  if  it  went  alone. 

Michael  had  no  idea  of  what  Germany  could  and  would 
do  to  his  soul. 

Otherwise  he  might  have  listened  to  what  Paris  had  to 
say  by  way  of  warning. 

For  his  father  had  given  him  a  fortnight  in  Paris  on 
his  way  to  Germany,  as  the  reward  of  acquiescence. 
That  (from  Herr  Harrison's  point  of  view)  was  a  disas- 
trous blunder.     How  could  the  dear  old  Pater  be  expected 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  183 

to  know  that  Paris  is,  spiritually  speaking,  no  sort  of  way 
even  to  South  Germany  ?  He  should  have  gone  to  Brus- 
sels, if  he  was  ever,  spiritually  speaking,  to  get  there 
at  all. 

And  neither  Anthony  nor  Frances  knew  that  Lawrence 
Stephen  had  plans  for  Michael. 

Michael  went  to  Paris  with  his  unpublished  poems  in 
his  pocket  and  a  letter  of  introduction  from  Stephen  to 
Jules  Reveillaud.  He  left  it  with  revolution  in  his  soul 
and  the  published  poems  of  Reveillaud  and  his  followers 
in  his  suit-case,  straining  and  distending  it  so  that  it 
burst  open  of  its  own  accord  at  the  frontier. 

Lawrence  Stephen  had  said  to  him :  "  Before  you 
write  another  line  read  Reveillaud  and  show  him  what 
you've  written." 

Jules  Reveillaud  was  ten  years  older  than  Michael, 
and  he  recognized  the  symptoms  of  the  crisis.  He  could 
see  what  was  happening  and  what  had  happened  and 
would  happen  in  Michael's  soul.  He  said :  "  One  third 
of  each  of  your  poems  is  good.  And  there  are  a  few  — 
the  three  last  —  which  are  all  good." 

"  Those,"  said  Michael,  "  are  only  experiments." 

"  Precisely.  They  are  experiments  that  have  suc- 
ceeded. That  is  why  they  are  good.  Art  is  always  ex- 
periment, or  it  is  nothing.  Do  not  publish  these  poems 
yet.  Wait  and  see  what  happens.  Make  more  experi- 
ments. And  whatever  you  do,  do  not  go  to  Germany. 
That  School  of  Forestry  would  be  very  bad  for  you. 
Why  not,"  said  Reveillaud,  "  stay  where  you  are  ?  " 

Michael  would  have  liked  to  stay  for  ever  where  he  was, 
in  Paris  with  Jules  Reveillaud,  in  the  Rue  Servandoni. 


1 84  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  because  his  conscience  kept  on  telling  him  that  he 
would  be  a  coward  and  a  blackguard  if  he  stayed  in  Paris, 
he  wrenched  himself  away. 

In  the  train,  going  into  Germany,  he  read  Reveillaud's 
"  Poemes  "  and  the  "  Poemes  "  of  the  young  men  who  fol- 
lowed him.  lie  had  read  in  Paris  Reveillaud's  "  Critique 
de  la  Poesie  Anglaise  Contemporaine."  And  as  he  read 
his  poems,  he  saw  that,  though  he,  Michael  Harrison,  had 
split  with  "  la  poesie  anglaise  contemporaine,"  he  was  not, 
as  he  had  supposed,  alone.  His  idea  of  being  by  himself, 
of  finding  new  forms,  doing  new  things  by  himself  to 
the  disgust  and  annoyance  of  other  people,  in  a  world 
where  only  one  person,  Lawrence  Stephen,  understood  or 
cared  for  what  he  did,  it  was  pure  illusion.  These  young 
Frenchmen,  with  Jules  Reveillaud  at  their  head,  were  do- 
ing the  same  thing,  making  the  same  experiment,  believ- 
ing in  the  experiment,  caring  for  nothing  but  the  experi- 
ment, and  carrying  it  farther  than  he  had  dreamed  of 
carrying  it.  They  were  not  so  far  ahead  of  him  in  time ; 
Reveillaud  himself  had  only  two  years'  start ;  but  they 
were  all  going  the  same  way,  and  he  saw  that  he  must 
either  go  with  them  or  collapse  in  the  soft  heap  of  rotten- 
ness, "  la  poesie  anglaise  contemporaine." 

lie  had  made  his  own  experiments  in  what  he  called 
"  live  verse  "  before  he  left  England,  after  he  had  said 
he  would  go  to  Germany,  even  after  the  final  arrange- 
ments had  been  made.  His  father  had  given  him  a  month 
to  "  turn  round  in,"  as  he  put  it.  And  Michael  had 
turned  completely  round. 

He  had  not  shown  his  experiments  to  Stephen.     He 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  185 

didn't  know  what  to  think  of  them  himself.  But  he 
could  see,  when  once  Reveillaud  had  pointed  it  out  to  him, 
that  they  were  the  stuff  that  counted. 

In  the  train  going  into  Germany  he  thought  of  certain 
things  that  Reveillaud  had  said :  "  Nous  avons  trempe 
la  poesie  dans  la  peinture  et  la  musique.  II  faut  la 
delivrer  par  la  sculpture.  Chaque  Hgne,  chaque  vers, 
chaque  poeme  taille  en  bloc,  sans  couleur,  sans  decor,  sans 
rime."  ..."  La  sainte  pauvresse  du  style  depouille." 
..."  II  faut  de  la  durete,  toujours  de  la  durete." 

He  thought  of  Reveillaud's  criticism,  and  his  sudden 
startled  spurt  of  admiration :  "  Mais !  Vous  1'  avez 
trouvee,  la  beaute  de  la  ligne  droite." 

And  Reveillaud's  question :  "  Vraiment  ?  Vous 
n'avez  jamais  lu  un  seul  vers  de  mes  poemes?  Alors, 
c'est  etonnant."  And  then :  "  C'est  que  la  realite  est 
plus  forte  que  nous." 

The  revolting  irony  of  it !  After  stumbling  and  fum- 
bling for  years  by  himself,  like  an  idiot,  trying  to  get  it, 
the  clear  hard  Reality ;  trying  not  to  collapse  into  the  soft 
heap  of  contemporary  rottenness;  and,  suddenly,  to  get 
it  without  knowing  that  he  had  got  it,  so  that,  but  for 
Reveillaud,  he  might  easily  have  died  in  his  ignorance; 
and  then,  in  the  incredible  moment  of  realization,  to  have 
to  let  go,  to  turn  his  back  on  Paris,  where  he  wanted  to 
live,  and  on  Reveillaud  whom  he  wanted  to  know,  and  to 
be  packed  in  a  damnable  train,  like  a  parcel,  and  sent 
off  to  Germany,  a  country  which  he  did  not  even  wish 
to  see. 

He  wondered  if  he  could  have  done  it  if  he  had  not 


1 86  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

loved  bis  father  ?  He  wondered  if  his  father  would  ever 
understand  that  it  was  the  hardest  thing  he  had  ever 
yet  done  or  could  do  ? 

But  the  trees  would  be  beautiful.     He  would  rather 
like  seeing  the  trees. 


Trees  — 

He  wondered  whether  he  would  ever  care  about  a  tree 
again. 

Trees  — 

He  wondered  whether  he  would  ever  see  a  tree  again, 
ever  smell  tree-sap,  or  hear  the  wind  sounding  in  the  ash- 
trees  like  a  river  and  in  the  firs  like  a  sea. 

Trees  — 

He  wondered  whether  any  tree  would  ever  come  to 
life  for  him  again. 

He  looked  on  at  the  tree-felling.  He  saw  slaughtered 
trees,  trees  that  tottered,  trees  that  staggered  in  each 
other's  branches.  He  heard  the  scream  and  the  shriek 
of  wounded  boughs,  the  creaking  and  crashing  of  the 
trunk,  and  the  long  hiss  of  branches  falling,  trailing 
through  branches  to  the  ground.  He  smelt  the  raw  juice 
of  broken  leaves  and  the  sharp  tree  dust  in  the  saw  pits. 

The  trees  died  horrible  deaths,  in  the  forests  under 
the  axes  of  the  woodmen,  and  in  the  schools  under  the 
tongues  of  the  Professors,  and  in  Michael's  soul.  The 
German  Government  was  determined  that  he  should  know 
all  about  trees.  Its  officials,  the  Professors  and  instruc- 
tors, were  sorry  if  he  didn't  like  it,  but  they  were  ordered 
by  their  Government  and  paid  by  their  Government  to 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  187 

impart  this  information;  they  had  contracted  with  Herr 
Harrison  to  impart  it  to  his  son  Michael  for  so  long  as 
he  could  endure  it,  and  they  imparted  it  with  all  their 
might. 

Michael  rather  liked  the  Germans  of  Aschaffenburg. 
Instead  of  despising  him  because  he  would  never  make  a 
timber-merchant  or  a  tree  expert,  they  admired  and  re- 
spected him  because  he  was  a  poet.  The  family  he  lived 
with,  Herr  Henschel  and  Frau  Henschel,  and  his  fel- 
low-boarders, Carl  and  Otto  Kraus,  and  young  Ludwig 
Henschel,  and  Hedwig  and  Lottchen  admired  and  re- 
spected him  because  he  was  a  poet.  When  he  walked 
with  Ludwig  in  the  great  forests  Michael  chanted  his 
poems,  both  in  English  and  in  German,  till  Ludwig's 
soul  was  full  of  yearning  and  a  delicious  sorrow,  so  that 
Ludwig  actually  shed  tears  in  the  forest.  He  said  that 
if  he  had  not  done  so  he  would  have  burst.  Ludwig's 
emotions  had  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the  forest  or 
with  Michael's  poems,  but  he  thought  they  had. 

Michael  knew  that  his  only  chance  of  getting  out  of 
Germany  was  to  show  an  unsurpassable  incompetence. 
He  showed  it.  He  flourished  his  incompetence  in  the  faces 
of  all  the  officials,  until  some  superofficial  wrote  a  letter 
to  his  father  that  gave  him  his  liberty. 

The  Henschels  were  sorry  when  he  left.  The  students, 
Otto  and  Carl  and  Ludwig,  implored  him  not  to  forget 
them.     Hedwig  and  Lottchen  cried. 


Michael  was  not  pleased  when  he  found  that  he  was  to 
go  home  by  Dresden  to  bring  Veronica  back.     He  wanted 


1 88  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

to  be  alone  on  the  journey.  He  wanted  to  stop  in  Paris 
and  see  Jules  Reveillaud.  Ho  was  afraid  that  Ronny 
had  grown  into  a  tiresome  flapper  and  that  he  would  have 
to  talk  to  her. 

And  he  found  that  Ronny  had  skipped  the  tiresome 
stage  and  had  grown  up.  Only  her  school  clothes  and 
her  girlish  door-knocker  plait  tied  up  with  broad  black 
ribbon  reminded  him  that  she  was  not  yet  seventeen. 

Ronny  was  tired.  She  did  not  want  to  talk.  When  he 
had  tucked  her  up  with  railway  rugs  in  her  corner  of  the 
carriage  she  sat  still  with  her  hands  in  her  muff. 

"  I  shall  not  disturb  your  thoughts,  Michael,"  she  said. 

She  knew  what  he  had  been  thinking.  Her  clear  eyes 
gazed  at  him  out  of  her  dead  white  face  with  an  awful 
look  of  spiritual  maturity. 

"What  can  have  happened  to  her?"  he  wondered. 

But  she  did  not  disturb  his  thoughts. 

Up  till  then  Michael's  thoughts  had  not  done  him  any 
good.  They  had  been  bitter  thoughts  of  the  months  he 
had  been  compelled  to  waste  in  Bavaria  when  every  min- 
ute had  an  incomparable  value;  worrying,  irritating 
thoughts  of  the  scenes  he  would  have  to  have  with  his 
father,  who  must  be  made  to  understand,  once  for  all, 
that  in  future  he  meant  to  have  every  minute  of  his  own 
life  for  his  own  work.  He  wondered  how  on  earth  he  was 
to  make  his  people  see  that  his  work  justified  his  giving 
every  minute  to  it.  He  had  asked  Reveillaud  to  give  him 
a  letter  that  he  could  show  to  his  father.  He  was  angry 
with  his  father  beforehand,  he  was  so  certain  that  he 
wouldn't  see. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  189 

He  had  other  thoughts  now.  Thoughts  of  an  almond 
tree  flowering  in  a  white  town;  of  pink  blossoms,  fragile, 
without  leaves,  casting  a  thin  shadow  on  white  stones; 
the  smell  of  almond  flowers  and  the  sting  of  white  dust  in 
an  east  wind ;  a  drift  of  white  dust  against  the  wall. 

Thoughts  of  pine-trees  falling  in  the  forest,  glad  to 
fall.  He  thought:  The  pine  forest  makes  itself  a  sea 
for  the  land  wind,  and  the  young  pine  tree  is  mad  for  the 
open  sea.  She  gives  her  slender  trunk  with  passion  to 
the  ax;  for  she  thinks  that  she  will  be  stripped  naked, 
and  that  she  will  be  planted  in  the  ship's  hold,  and  that 
she  will  carry  the  great  main-sail.  She  thinks  that  she 
will  rock  and  strain  in  the  grip  of  the  sea-wind,  and  that 
she  will  be  whitened  with  the  salt  and  the  foam  of  the  sea. 

She  does  not  know  that  she  will  be  sawn  into  planks 
and  made  into  a  coffin  for  the  wife  of  the  sexton  and 
grave-digger  of  Aschaffenburg. 

Thoughts  of  Veronica  in  her  incredible  maturity,  and 
of  her  eyes,  shining  in  her  dead  white  face,  far  back 
through  deep  crystal,  and  of  the  sense  he  got  of  her  soul 
poised,  steady  and  still,  with  wings  vibrating. 

He  wondered  where  it  would  come  down. 

He  thought :  "  Of  course,  Veronica's  soul  will  come 
down  like  a  wild  pigeon  into  the  ash-tree  in  our  garden, 
and  she  will  think  that  our  ash-tree  is  a  tree  of  Heaven." 


Presently  he  roused  himself  to  talk  to  her. 
"  How  is  your  singing  getting  on,  Ronny  ?  " 
"  My  singing  voice  has  gone." 


igo  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  It'll  come  back  again." 
"  Not  unless  — " 

But  he  couldn't  make  her  tell  him  what  would  bring  it 
back. 


When  Michael  came  to  his  father  and  mother  to  have 
it  out  with  them  his  face  had  a  hard,  stubborn  look.  He 
was  ready  to  fight  them.  He  was  so  certain  that  he  would 
have  to  fight.  He  had  shown  them  Jules  Reveillaud's 
letter. 

He  said,  "  Look  here,  we've  got  to  get  it  straight.  It 
isn't  any  use  going  on  like  this.  I'm  afraid  I  wasn't 
very  honest  about  Germany." 

"  Weren't  you  ?  "  said  Anthony.  "  Let  me  see,  I  think 
you  said  you'd  take  it  on  your  way  to  China  and  Japan." 

"  Did  I  ?  I  tried  to  be  straight  about  it.  I  thought  I 
was  giving  it  a  fair  chance.  But  that  was  before  I'd 
seen  Reveillaud." 

"  Well,"  said  Anthony,  "  now  that  you  have  seen  him, 
what  is  it  exactly  that  you  want  to  do  ?  " 

Michael   told   him. 

"  You  can  make  it  easy  for  me.  Or  you  can  make  it 
hard.     But  you  can't  stop  me." 

"  What  makes  you  think  I  want  to  stop  you  ?  " 

"  Well  —  you  want  me  to  go  into  the  business,  though 
I  told  you  years  ago  there  was  only  one  thing  I  should 
ever  be  any  good  at.  And  I  see  your  point.  I  can't 
earn  my  living  at  it.  That's  where  I'm  had.  Still,  I 
think  Lawrence  Stephen  will  give  me  work,  and  I  can 
rub  along  somehow." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  191 

"  Without  my  help,  you  mean  ?  " 

"  Well,  yes.  Why  should  you  help  me  ?  You've 
wasted  tons  of  money  on  me  as  it  is.  Nicky's  earning  his 
own  living,  and  he's  got  a  wife,  too.     Why  not  me  ?  " 

"  Because  you  can't  do  it,  Michael." 

"  I  can.  I  don't  mind  roughing  it.  I  could  live  on  a 
hundred  a  year  —  or  less,  if  I  don't  marry." 

"  Well,  I  don't  mean  you  to  try.  You  needn't  bother 
about  what  you  can  live  on  and  what  you  can't  live  on. 
It  was  all  settled  last  night.  Your  mother  and  I  talked 
it  over.  We  don't  want  you  to  go  into  the  business.  We 
don't  want  you  to  take  work  from  Mr.  Stephen.  We 
want  you  to  be  absolutely  free  to  do  your  own  work,  un- 
der the  best  possible  conditions,  whether  it  pays  or  not. 
Nothing  in  the  world  matters  to  us  but  your  happiness. 
You're  to  have  a  hundred  and  fifty  a  year  when  you're 
living  at  home  and  two  hundred  and  fifty  when  you're 
living  abroad.  I  suppose  you'll  want  to  go  abroad  some- 
times. I  can't  give  you  a  bigger  allowance,  because  I 
have  to  help  Nicky  — " 

Michael  covered  his  face  with  his  hands. 

"  Oh  —  don't,  Daddy.  You  do  make  me  feel  a  rotten 
beast." 

"  We  should  feel  rottener  beasts,"  said  Frances,  "  if  we 
stood  in  your  way." 

"  Then,"  said  Michael  (he  was  still  incredulous),  "you 
do  care  ?  " 

"  Of  course  we  care,"  said  Anthony. 

"  I  don't  mean  for  me  —  for  it  ?  " 

"  My  dear  Mick,"  said  Frances,  "  we  care  for  It  al- 
most as  much  as  we  care  for  you.     We're  sorry  about 


i92  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Germany  though.  Germany  was  one  of  your  father's 
bad  jokes." 

"  Germany  —  a  joke  ?  " 

"  Did  you  take  it  seriously?     Oh,  you  silly  Michael!  " 

"  But,"  said  Michael,  "  how  about  Daddy's  idea  ?  He 
loved  it." 

"  I  loved  it,"  said  Anthony,  "  but  I've  given  it  up." 

They  knew  that  this  was  defeat,  for  Michael  was  top- 
dog.     And  it  was  also  victory. 

They  had  lost  Nicholas,  or  thought  they  had  lost  Nich- 
olas, by  opposing  him.  But  Michael  and  Michael's  af- 
fection they  would  have  always. 

Besides,  Anthony  hadn't  given  up  his  idea.  He  had 
only  transferred  it  —  to  his  youngest  son,  John. 


XV 

It  was  five  weeks  since  Nicholas's  wedding-day  and 
Desmond  had  quarrelled  with  him  three  times. 

First,  because  he  had  taken  a  flat  in  Aubrey  Walk, 
with  a  studio  inside  it,  instead  of  a  house  in  Campden 
Hill  Square  with  a  studio  outside  it  in  the  garden. 

Then,  because  he  had  refused  to  go  into  his  father's 
business. 

Last  of  all,  because  of  Captain  Drayton  and  the  Mov- 
ing Fortress. 

Nicky  had  said  that  his  father,  who  was  paying  his 
rent,  couldn't  afford  the  house  with  the  studio  in  the 
garden;  and  Desmond  said  Nicky's  father  could  afford 
it  perfectly  well  if  he  liked.  He  said  he  had  refused  to 
go  into  his  father's  business  for  reasons  which  didn't  con- 
cern her.  Desmond  pointed  out  that  the  consequences 
of  his  refusal  were  likely  to  concern  her  very  much  in- 
deed. As  for  Captain  Drayton  and  the  Moving  Fortress, 
nobody  but  a  supreme  idiot  would  have  done  what  Nicky 
did. 

But  Nicky  absolutely  refused  to  discuss  what  he  had 
done.  Nobody  but  a  cad  and  a  rotter  would  have  done 
anything  else. 

In  the  matter  of  the  Moving  Fortress  what  had  hap- 
pened was  this. 

The  last  of  the  drawings  was  not  finished  until  Desmond 
had   settled   down   in   the    flat    in    Aubrey    Walk.     You 

193 


194  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

couldn't  hurry  Desmond.  Nicky  hadn't  even  waited  to 
sign  his  name  in  the  margins  before  he  had  packed  the 
plans  in  his  dispatch  box  and  taken  them  to  the  works, 
and  thence,  hidden  under  a  pile  of  Morss  estimates,  to 
Eltham.  He  couldn't  rest  till  he  had  shown  them  to 
Frank  Drayton.  He  could  hardly  wait  till  they  had 
dined,  and  till  Drayton,  who  thought  he  was  on  the  track 
of  a  new  and  horrible  explosive,  had  told  him  as  much  as 
he  could  about  it. 

Nicky  gave  his  whole  mind  to  Drayton's  new  explosive 
in  the  hope  that,  when  his  turn  came,  Drayton  would  do 
as  much  for  him. 

"  You  know,"  he  said  at  last,  "  the  old  idea  of  the 
forteresse  mobile?" 

"  Yes." 

He  couldn't  tell  whether  Drayton  was  going  to  be  in- 
terested or  not.     He  rather  thought  he  wasn't. 

"It  hasn't  come  to  anything,  has  it?" 

Drayton  smiled  and  his  eyes  glittered.  He  knew  what 
that  excited  gleam  in  Drayton's  eyes  meant. 

«  No,"  he  said.     "  Not  yet." 

And  Nicky  had  an  awful  premonition  of  his  doom. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  "  I  believe  there's  something  in  it." 

"  So  do  I,  Nicky." 

Drayton  went  on.  "  I  believe  there's  so  much  in  it 
that  —  Look  here,  I  don't  know  what  put  it  into  your 
head,  and  I'm  not  asking,  but  that  idea's  a  dead  secret. 
For  God's  sake  don't  talk  about  it.  You  mustn't  breathe 
it,  or  it'll  get  into  the  air.  And  if  it  does  my  five  years' 
work  goes  for  nothing.  Besides  v/c  don't  want  Germany 
to  collar  it." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  195 

And  then :  "  Don't  look  so  scared,  old  chap.  I  was 
going  to  tell  you  about  it  when  I'd  got  the  plans  drawn." 

He  told  him  about  it  then  and  there. 

"  Low  on  the  ground  like  a  racing-car  — " 

"Yes,"  said  Nicky. 

"  Revolving  turret  for  the  guns  —  no  higher  than 
that  — " 

"Yes,"  said  Nicky. 

"  Sort  of  armoured  train.  Only  it  mustn't  run  on 
rails.  It's  got  to  go  everywhere,  through  anything,  over 
anything,  if  it  goes  at  all.  It  must  turn  in  its  own 
length.  It  must  wade  and  burrow  and  climb,  Nicky.  It 
must  have  caterpillar  wheels  — " 

"  By  Jove,  of  course  it  must,"  said  Nicky,  as  if  the  idea 
had  struck  him  for  the  first  time. 

"  What  have  you  got  there  ?  "  said  Drayton  finally  as 
Nicky  rose  and  picked  up  his  dispatch-box.  "  Anything 
interesting  ?  " 

"No,"  said  Nicky.     "Mostly  estimates." 

For  a  long  time  afterwards  he  loathed  the  fields  between 
Eltham  and  Kidbrooke,  and  the  Mid-Kent  line,  and  Char- 
ing Cross  Station.  He  felt  as  a  man  feels  when  the 
woman  he  loves  goes  from  him  to  another  man.  His  idea 
had  gone  from  him  to  Drayton. 

And  that,  he  said  to  himself,  was  just  like  his  luck, 
just  like  the  jolly  sells  that  happened  to  him  when  he  was 
a  kid. 

To  be  sure,  there  was  such  a  thing  as  sharing.  He  had 
only  to  produce  his  plans  and  his  finished  model,  and  he 
and  Drayton  would  go  partners  in  the  Moving  Fortress. 
There  was  no  reason  why  he  shouldn't  do  it.     Drayton 


i96  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

had  not  even  drawn  his  plans  yet;  he  hadn't  thought  out 
the  mechanical  details. 

He  thought,  "  I  could  go  back  now  and  tell  him." 

But  he  did  not  go  back.  He  knew  that  he  would 
never  tell  him.  If  Drayton  asked  him  to  help  him  with 
the  details  he  would  work  them  out  all  over  again  with 
him;  but  he  would  never  show  his  own  finished  plans  or 
his  own  model. 

He  didn't  know  whether  it  had  been  hard  or  easy  for 
him  to  give  up  the  Moving  Fortress.  He  did  it  instinc- 
tively. There  was  —  unless  he  had  chosen  to  be  a  black- 
guard —  nothing  else  for  him  to  do. 

Besides,  the  Moving  Fortress  wasn't  his  idea.  Drayton 
had  had  it  first.  Anybody  might  have  had  it.  He  hadn't 
spoken  of  it  first;  but  that  was  nothing.  The  point  was 
that  he  had  had  it  first,  and  Nicky  wasn't  going  to  take  it 
from  him. 

It  meant  more  to  Drayton,  who  was  in  the  Service,  than 
it  could  possibly  mean  to  him.  He  hadn't  even  got  a  pro- 
fession. 

As  he  walked  back  through  the  fields  to  the  station,  he 
said  to  himself  that  he  didn't  really  care.  It  was  only 
one  more  jolly  sell.  He  didn't  like  giving  up  his  Moving 
Fortress ;  but  it  wouldn't  end  him.  There  was  something 
in  him  that  would  go  on. 

He  would  make  another  engine. 

He  didn't  care.  There  was  something  in  him  that 
would  go  on. 


"  I    can't    see,"    Desmond    had    said,    "  why    Captain 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  197 

Drayton  should  be  allowed  to  walk  off  with  your  idea." 
"  He's  worked  five  years  on  it." 
"  He  hasn't  worked  it  out  yet,  and  you  have.     Can't 

you  see  " —  her  face  was  dark  and  hard  with  anger  — 

"  there's  money  in  it  ?  " 

"  If  there  is,  all  the  more  reason  why  I  shouldn't  bag  it." 
"  And  where  do  I  come  in  ?  " 

"  Not  just  here,  I'm  afraid.     It  isn't  your  business." 
"  Not  my  business  ?     When  I  did  the  drawings  ?     You 

couldn't  possibly  have  done  them  yourself." 

At  that  point  Nicky  refused   to   discuss   the  matter 

farther. 

And  still  Desmond  brooded  on  her  grievance.     And 

still  at  intervals  Desmond  brought  it  up  again. 

"  There's  stacks  of  money  in  your  father's  business  — " 
"  There's  stacks  of  money  in  that  Moving  Fortress  — " 
"  You  are  a  fool,  Nicky,  to  throw  it  all  away." 
He  never  answered  her.     He  said  to  himself  that  Des- 
mond was  hysterical  and  had  a  morbid  fancy. 


But  it  didn't  end  there. 

He  had  taken  the  drawings  and  the  box  that  had  the 
model  of  the  Moving  Fortress  in  it  and  buried  them  in 
the  locker  under  the  big  north  window  in  Desmond's 
studio. 

And  there,  three  weeks  later,  Desmond  found  them. 
And  she  packed  the  model  of  the  Moving  Portress  and 
marked  it  "  Urgent  with  Care,"  and  sent  it  to  the  War 
Office  with  a  letter.  She  packed  the  drawings  in  a  port- 
folio —  having  signed  her  own  and  Nicky's  name  on  the 


i98  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

margins  —  and  sent  them  to  Captain  Drayton  with  a 
letter.  She  said  she  had  no  doubt  she  was  doing  an 
immoral  thing ;  but  she  did  it  in  fairness  to  Captain  Dray- 
ton, for  she  was  sure  he  would  not  like  Nicky  to  make  so 
great  a  sacrifice.  Nicky,  she  said,  was  wrapped  up  in 
his  Gloving  Fortress.  It  was  his  sweetheart,  his  baby. 
"  He  will  never  forgive  me,"  she  said,  "  as  long  as  he 
lives.  But  I  simply  had  to  let  you  know.  It  means  so 
much  to  him." 

For  she  thought,  "  Because  Nicky's  a  fool,  I  needn't  be 
one." 

Drayton  came  over  the  same  evening  after  he  had  got 
the  letter.     He  shouted  with  laughter. 

"  Nicky,"  he  said,  "  you  filthy  rotter,  why  on  earth 
didn't  you  tell  me  ?  ...  It  was  Nickyish  of  you.  .  .  . 
What  if  I  did  think  of  it  first?  I  should  have  had  to 
come  to  you  for  the  details.  It  would  have  been  jolly  to 
have  worked  it  out  together.  .  .  .  Not  a  bit  of  it !  Your 
wife's  absolutely  right.  Good  thing,  after  all,  you  mar- 
ried her. 

"  By  the  way,  she  says  there's  a  model.  I  want  to  see 
that  model.     Have  you  got  it  here  ?  " 

Xicky  went  up  into  the  studio  to  look  for  it.  He 
couldn't  find  it  in  the  locker  where  he'd  left  it.  "  Wher- 
ever is  the  damned  thing  ?  "  he  said. 

"  The  damned  thing,"  said  Desmond,  "  is  where  you 
should  have  sent  it  first  of  all  —  at  the  War  Office. 
You're  clever,  Nicky,  but  you  aren't  quite  clever  enough." 

"  I'm  afraid,"  he  said,  "  you've  been  a  bit  too  clever, 
this  time." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  199 

Drayton  agreed  with  him.  It  was,  he  said,  about  the 
worst  thing  that  could  possibly  have  happened. 

"  She  shouldn't  have  done  that,  Nicky.  What  on  earth 
could  have  made  her  do  it  ?  " 

"  Don't  ask  me,"  said  Nicky,  "  what  makes  her  do 
things." 

"  It  looks,"  Drayton  meditated,  "  as  if  she  didn't  trust 
me.  I'm  afraid  she's  dished  us.  God  knows  whether  we 
can  ever  get  it  back !  " 

Desmond  had  a  fit  of  hysterics  when  she  realized  how 
clever  she  had  been. 


Desmond's  baby  was  born  late  in  November  of  that  year, 
and  it  died  when  it  was  two  weeks  old.  It  was  as  if  she 
had  not  wanted  it  enough  to  give  it  life  for  long  outside 
her  body. 

For  though  Desmond  had  been  determined  to  have  a 
child,  and  had  declared  that  she  had  a  perfect  right  to 
have  one  if  she  chose,  she  did  not  care  for  it  when  it  came. 
And  when  it  died  Nicky  was  sorrier  than  Desmond. 

He  had  not  wanted  to  be  a  father  to  Headley  Richards' 
child.  And  yet  it  was  the  baby  and  nothing  but  the  baby 
that  had  let  him  in  for  marrying  Desmond.  So  that, 
when  it  died,  he  felt  that  somehow  things  had  tricked  and 
sold  him.  As  they  had  turned  out  he  need  not  have  mar- 
ried Desmond  after  all. 

She  herself  had  pointed  out  the  extreme  futility  of  his 
behaviour,  lest  he  should  miss  the  peculiar  irony  of  it. 
For  when  her  fright  and  the  cause  of  her  fright  were 


200  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

gone  Desmond  resented  Nicky's  having  married  her.  She 
didn't  really  want  anybody  to  marry  her,  and  nobody  but 
Nicky  would  have  dreamed  of  doing  it. 

She  lay  weak  and  pathetic  in  her  bed  for  about  a  fort- 
night; and  for  a  little  while  after  she  was  content  to  lie 
stretched  out  among  her  cushions  on  the  studio  floor,  while 
Nicky  waited  on  her.  But,  when  she  got  well  and  came 
downstairs  for  good,  Nicky  saw  that  Desmond's  weakness 
and  pathos  had  come  with  the  baby  and  had  gone  with  it. 
The  real  Desmond  was  not  weak,  she  was  not  pathetic. 
She  was  strong  and  hard  and  clever  with  a  brutal  clever- 
ness. She  didn't  care  how  much  he  saw.  He  could  see 
to  the  bottom  of  her  nature,  if  he  liked,  and  feel  how 
hard  it  was.  She  had  no  more  interest  in  deceiving 
him. 

She  had  no  more  interest  in  him  at  all. 

She  was  interested  in  her  painting  again.  She  worked 
in  long  fits,  after  long  intervals  of  idleness.  She  worked 
with  a  hard,  passionless  efficiency.  Nicky  thought  her 
paintings  were  hideous  and  repulsive;  but  he  did  not  say 
so.  He  was  not  aware  of  the  extent  to  which  Desmond 
imitated  her  master,  Alfred  Orde-Jones.  He  knew  noth- 
ing about  painting  and  he  had  got  used  to  the  things. 
He  had  got  used  to  Desmond,  slouching  about  the  flat,  in 
her  sloping,  slovenly  grace,  dressed  in  her  queer  square 
jacket  and  straight  short  skirt,  showing  her  long  delicate 
ankles,  and  her  slender  feet  in  their  grey  stockings  and 
black  slippers. 

He  was  used  to  Desmond  when  she  was  lazy ;  when  she 
sat  hunched  up  on  her  cushions  and  smoked  one  cigarette 
after  another  without  a  word,  and  watched  him  sullenly. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  201 

Her  long,  slippered  feet,  thrust  out,  pointed  at  him,  watch- 
ing. Her  long  face  watched  him  between  the  sleek  bands 
of  hair  and  the  big  black  bosses  plaited  over  her  ears. 

The  beauty  of  Desmond's  face  had  gone  to  sleep  again, 
stilled  into  hardness  by  the  passing  of  her  passion.  A 
sort  of  ugliness  was  awake  there,  and  it  watched  him. 

In  putting  weakness  and  pathos  away  from  her  Des- 
mond had  parted  with  two-thirds  of  her  power.  Yet  the 
third  part  still  served  to  hold  him,  used  with  knowledge 
and  a  cold  and  competent  economy.  He  resented  it,  re- 
sisted it  over  and  over  again;  and  over  and  over  again  it 
conquered  resentment  and  resistance.  It  had  something 
to  do  with  her  subtle,  sloping  lines,  with  her  blackness  and 
her  sallow  whiteness,  with  the  delicate  scent  and  the 
smoothness  of  her  skin  under  the  sliding  hand.  He 
couldn't  touch  her  without  still  feeling  a  sort  of  pity,  a 
sort  of  affection. 

But  she  could  take  and  give  caresses  while  she  removed 
her  soul  from  him  in  stubborn  rancour. 

He  couldn't  understand  that.  It  amazed  him  every 
time.  He  thought  it  horrible.  For  Nicky's  memory 
was  faithful.  It  still  kept  the  impression  of  the  Des- 
mond he  had  married,  the  tender,  frightened,  helpless 
Desmond  he  had  thought  he  loved.  The  Desmond  he  re- 
membered reminded  him  of  Veronica. 

And  Desmond  said  to  herself,  "  He's  impossible.  You 
can't  make  any  impression  on  him.  I  might  as  well  be 
married  to  a  Moving  Fortress." 


Months  passed.     The  War  Office  had  not  yet  given  up 


202  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Nicky's  model  of  the  Moving  Fortress.  In  the  first  month 
it  was  not  aware  of  any  letter  or  of  any  parcel  or  of  any 
Mr.  Nicholas  Harrison.  In  the  second  month  inquiries 
would  be  made  and  the  results  communicated  to  Captain 
Drayton.  In  the  third  month  the  War  Office  knew  noth- 
ing of  the  matter  referred  to  by  Captain  Drayton. 

Drayton  hadn't  a  hope.  "  We  can't  get  it  back,  Nicky," 
he  said. 

"  I  can,"  said  Nicky,  "  I  can  get  it  back  out  of  my 
head." 

All  through  the  winter  of  nineteen-eleven  and  the  spring 
of  nineteen-twelve  they  worked  at  it  together.  They 
owned  that  they  were  thus  getting  better  results  than 
either  of  them  could  have  got  alone.  There  were  impos- 
sibilities about  Nicky's  model  that  a  gunner  would  have 
seen  at  once,  and  there  were  faults  in  Drayton's  plans  that 
an  engineer  would  not  have  made.  Nicky  couldn't  draw 
the  plans  and  Drayton  couldn't  build  the  models.  They 
said  it  was  fifty  times  better  fun  to  work  at  it  together. 

Nicky  was  happy. 


Desmond  watched  them  sombrely.  She  and  Alfred 
Orde-Jones,  the  painter,  laughed  at  them  behind  their 
backs.  She  said  "  How  funny  they  are  !  Frank  wouldn't 
hurt  a  fly  and  Nicky  wouldn't  say  l  Bo !  '  to  a  goose  if  he 
thought  it  would  frighten  the  goose,  and  yet  they're  only 
happy  when  they're  inventing  some  horrible  machine 
that'll  kill  thousands  of  people  who  never  did  them  any 
harm."  He  said,  "  That's  because  they  haven't  any 
imagination," 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  203 

Nicky  got  up  early  aud  went  to  bed  late  to  work  at  the 
Moving  Fortress.  The  time  between  had  to  be  given  to 
the  Works.  The  Company  had  paid  him  fairly  well  for 
all  his  patents  in  the  hope  of  getting  more  of  his  ideas, 
and  when  they  found  that  no  ideas  were  forthcoming  they 
took  it  out  of  him  in  labour.  He  was  too  busy  and  too 
happy  to  notice  what  Desmond  was  doing. 

One  day  Vera  said  to  him,  "  Nicky,  do  you  know  that 
Desmond  is  going  about  a  good  deal  with  Alfred  Orde- 
Jones  ?  " 

"  Is  she  ?     Is  there  any  reason  why  she  shouldn't  ?  " 
"  Not  unless  you  call  Orde-Jones  a  reason." 
"  You  mean  I've  got  to  stop  it  ?     How  can  I  ?  " 
"  You  can't.     Nothing  can  stop  Desmond." 
"  What  do  you  think  I  ought  to  do  about  it  ?  " 
"  Nothing.     She  goes  about  with  scores  of  people.     It 
doesn't  follow  that  there's  anything  in  it." 

"  Oh,  Lord,  I  should  hope  not !  That  beastly  bounder. 
What  could  there  be  in  it  ?  " 

"  He's  a  clever  painter,  Nicky.  So's  Desmond. 
There's  that  in  it." 

"  I've  hardly  a  right  to  object  to  that,  have  I  ?  It's 
not  as  if  I  were  a  clever  painter  myself." 

But    as    he    walked    home    between    the    white-walled 

gardens  of  St.  John's  Wood,  and  through  Regent's  Park 

and  Baker  Street,  and  down  the  north  side  of  Hyde  Park 

and  Kensington  Gardens,  he  worried  the  thing  to  shreds. 

There  couldn't  be  anything  in  it. 

He  could  see  Alfred  Orde-Jones  —  the  raking  swagger 
of  the  tall  lean  body  in  the  loose  trousers,  the  slouch  hat 
and  the  flowing  tie.     He  could  see  his  flowing  black  hair 


204  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

and  his  haggard,  eccentric  face  with  its  seven  fantastic 
accents,  the  black  eyebrows,  the  black  moustache,  the  high, 
close-clipped  side  whiskers,  the  two  forks  of  the  black 
beard. 

There  couldn't  be  anything  in  it. 

Orde-Jones's  mouth  was  full  of  rotten  teeth. 

And  yet  he  never  came  home  rather  later  than  usual 
without  saying  to  himself,  "  Supposing  I  was  to  find  him 
there  with  her  ?  " 

He  left  off  coming  home  late  so  that  he  shouldn't  have 
to  ask  himself  that  question. 

He  wondered  what  —  if  it  really  did  happen  —  he 
would  do.  He  wondered  what  other  men  did.  It  never 
occurred  to  him  that  at  twenty-two  he  was  young  to  be 
considering  this  problem. 

He  rehearsed  scenes  that  were  only  less  fantastic  than 
Orde-Jones's  face  and  figure,  or  that  owed  their  element 
of  fantasy  to  Orde-Jones's  face  and  figure.  He  saw  him- 
self assaulting  Orde-Jones  with  violence,  dragging  him 
out  of  Desmond's  studio,  and  throwing  him  downstairs. 
He  wondered  what  shapes  that  body  and  those  legs  and 
arms  would  take  when  they  got  to  the  bottom.  Perhaps 
they  wouldn't  get  to  the  bottom  all  at  once.  He  would 
hang  on  to  the  banisters.  He  saw  himself  simply  open- 
ing the  door  of  the  studio  and  ordering  Orde-Jones  to 
walk  out  of  it.  Really,  there  would  be  nothing  else  for 
him  to  do  but  to  walk  out,  and  he  would  look  an  awful 
ass  doing  it.  He  saw  himself  standing  in  the  room  and 
looking  at  them,  and  saying,  "  I've  no  intention  of  inter- 
rupting you."     Perhaps  Desmond  would  answer,  "  You're 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  205 

not  interrupting  us.  We've  finished  all  we  had  to  say." 
And  he  would  walk  out  and  leave  them  there.     Not  caring. 

He  wondered  if  he  would  look  an  awful  ass  doing  it. 

In  the  end,  when  it  came,  he  hadn't  to  do  any  of  these 
things.  It  happened  very  quietly  and  simply,  early  on 
a  Sunday  evening  after  he  had  got  back  from  Eltham. 
He  had  dined  with  Drayton  and  his  people  on  Saturday, 
and  stayed,  for  once,  over-night,  risking  it. 

Desmond  was  sitting  on  a  cushion,  on  the  floor,  with 
her  thin  legs  in  their  grey  stockings  slanting  out  in  front 
of  her.  She  propped  her  chin  on  her  hands.  Her  thin, 
long  face,  between  the  great  black  ear-bosses,  looked  at 
him  thoughtfully,  without  rancour. 

"  Nicky,"  she  said,  "  Alfred  Orde-Jones  slept  with  me 
last  night." 

And  he  said,  simply  and  quietly,  "  Very  well,  Desmond ; 
then  I  shall  leave  you.  You  can  keep  the  flat,  and  I  or  my 
father  will  make  you  an  allowance.  I  shan't  divorce  you, 
but  I  won't  live  with  you." 

"  Why  won't  you  divorce  me  ?  "  she  said. 

"  Because  I  don't  want  to  drag  you  through  the  dirt." 

She  laughed  quietly.  "  Dear  Nicky,"  she  said,  "  how 
sweet  and  like  you.  But  don't  let's  have  any  more  chival- 
rous idiocy.  I  don't  want  it.  I  never  did."  (She  had 
forgotten  that  she  had  wanted  it  very  badly  once.  But 
Nicky  did  not  remind  her  of  that  time.  No  matter. 
She  didn't  want  it  now).  "Let's  look  at  the  thing  sen- 
sibly, without  any  rotten  sentiment.  We've  had  some 
good  times  together,  and  we've  had  some  bad  times.  I'll 
admit  that  when  you  married  me  you  saved  me  from  a 


206  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

very  bad  time.  That's  no  reason  why  we  should  go  on 
giving  each  other  worse  times  indefinitely.  You  seem  to 
think  I  don't  want  you  to  divorce  me.  What  else  do  you 
imagine  Alfred  came  for  last  night  ?  Why  we've  been 
trying  for  it  for  the  last  three  months. 

"  Of  course,  if  you'll  let  me  divorce  you  for  desertion, 
it  would  be  very  nice  of  you.  That,"  said  Desmond,  "  is 
what  decent  people  do." 

He  went  out  and  telephoned  to  his  father.  Then  he 
left  her  and  went  back  to  his  father's  house. 

Desmond  asked  the  servant  to  remember  particularly 
that  it  was  the  fifteenth  of  June  and  that  the  master  was 
going  away  and  would  not  come  back  again. 


As  Nicky  walked  up  the  hill  and  across  the  Heath,  he 
wondered  why  it  had  happened,  and  why,  now  that  it  had 
happened,  he  cared  so  little.  He  could  have  understood 
it  if  he  hadn't  cared  at  all  for  Desmond.  But  he  had 
cared  in  a  sort  of  way.  If  she  had  cared  at  all  for  him  he 
thought  they  might  have  made  something  of  it,  something 
enduring,  perhaps,  if  they  had  had  children  of  their  own. 

He  still  couldn't  think  why  it  had  happened.  But  he 
knew  that,  even  if  he  had  loved  Desmond  with  passion,  it 
wouldn't  have  been  the  end  of  him.  The  part  of  him  that 
didn't  care,  that  hadn't  cared  much  when  he  lost  his  Mov- 
ing Fortress,  was  the  part  that  Desmond  never  would  have 
cared  for. 

He  didn't  know  whether  it  was  outside  him  and  beyond 
him,  bigger  and  stronger  than  he  was,  or  whether  it  was 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  207 

deep  inside,  the  most  real  part  of  him.  Whatever  hap- 
pened or  didn't  happen  it  would  go  on. 

How  could  he  have  ended  here,  with  poor  little  Des- 
mond ?  There  was  something  ahead  of  him,  something 
that  he  felt  to  be  tremendous  and  holy.  He  had  always 
known  it  waited  for  him.  He  was  going  out  to  meet  it; 
and  because  of  it  he  didn't  care. 

And  after  a  year  of  Desmond  he  was  glad  to  go  back  to 
his  father's  house;  even  though  he  knew  that  the  thing 
that  waited  for  him  was  not  there. 

Frances  and  Anthony  were  happy  again.  After  all, 
Heaven  had  manipulated  their  happiness  with  exquisite 
art  and  wisdom,  letting  Michael  and  Nicholas  go  from 
them  for  a  little  while  that  they  might  have  them  again 
more  completely,  and  teaching  them  the  art  and  wisdom 
that  would  keep  them. 

Some  day  the  children  would  marry ;  even  Nicky  might 
marry  again.  They  would  prepare  now,  by  small  daily 
self-denials,  for  the  big  renunciation  that  must  come. 

Yet  in  secret  they  thought  that  Michael  would  never 
marry;  that  Nicky,  made  prudent  by  disaster,  wasn't 
really  likely  to  marry  again.  John  would  marry;  and 
they  would  be  happy  in  John's  happiness  and  in  John's 
children. 

And  Nicky  had  not  been  home  before  he  offered  to  his 
parents  the  spectacle  of  an  outrageous  gaiety.  You  would 
have  said  that  life  to  Nicholas  was  an  amusing  game 
where  you  might  win  or  lose,  but  either  way  it  didn't 
matter.  It  was  a  rag,  a  sell.  Even  the  preceedings,  the 
involved  and  ridiculous  proceedings  of  his  divorce, 
amused  him. 


ao8  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

It  was  undeniably  funny  that  be  should  be  supposed  to 
have  deserted  Desmond. 

Frances  wondered,  again,  whether  Nicky  really  had 
any  feelings,  and  whether  things  really  made  any  impres- 
sion on  him. 


XVI 

It  was  a  quarter  past  five  on  a  fine  morning,  early  in 
July.  On  the  stroke  of  the  quarter  Captain  Frank  Dray- 
ton's motor-car,  after  exceeding  the  speed  limit  along  the 
forlorn  highway  of  the  Caledonian  Road,  drew  up  outside 
the  main  entrance  of  Holloway  Gaol.  Captain  Frank 
Drayton  was  alone  in  his  motor-car. 

He  had  the  street  all  to  himself  till  twenty  past  five, 
when  he  was  joined  by  another  motorist,  also  conspic- 
uously alone  in  his  car.  Drayton  tried  hard  to  look  as  if 
the  other  man  were  not  there. 

The  other  man  tried  even  harder  to  look  as  if  he  were 
not  there  himself.  He  was  the  first  to  be  aware  of  the 
absurdity  of  their  competitive  pretences.  He  looked  at 
his  watch  and  spoke. 

"  I  hope  they'll  be  punctual  with  those  doors.  I  was 
up  at  four  o'clock." 

"  I,"-  said  Drayton,  "  was  up  at  three." 

"  I'm  waiting  for  my  wife,"  said  the  other  man. 

"  I  am  not,"  said  Drayton,  and  felt  that  he  had  scored. 

The  other  man's  smile  allowed  him  the  point  he  made. 

"  Yes,  but  my  wife  happens  to  be  Lady  Victoria  Threl- 
fall." 

The  other  man  laughed  as  if  he  had  made  by  far  the 
better  joke. 

Drayton  recognized  Mr.  Augustin  Threlfall,  that  Cab- 
inet Minister  made  notorious  by  his  encounters  with  the 

Women's     Franchise     Union.     Last     year     Miss     Maud 

209 


210  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Blackadder  had  stalked  him  in  the  Green  Park  and  lamed 
him  by  a  blow  from  her  hunting-crop.  This  year  his 
wife,  Lady  Victoria  Threlfall,  had  headed  the  June  raid 
on  the  House  of  Commons. 

And  here  he  was  at  twenty  minutes  past  five  in  the 
morning  waiting  to  take  her  out  of  prison. 

And  here  was  Drayton,  waiting  for  Dorothea,  who  was 
not  his  wife  yet. 

"  Anyhow,"  said  the  Cabinet  Minister,  "  we've  done 
them  out  of  their  Procession." 

"  What  Procession  ?  " 

All  that  Drayton  knew  about  it  was  that,  late  last  night, 
a  friend  he  had  in  the  Home  Office  had  telephoned  to  him 
that  the  hour  of  Miss  Dorothea  Harrison's  release  would 
be  five-thirty,  not  six-thirty  as  the  papers  had  it. 

"  The  Procession,"  said  the  Cabinet  Minister,  "  that 
was  to  have  met  'em  at  six-thirty.  A  Car  of  Victory 
for  Mrs.  Blathwaite,  and  a  bodyguard  of  thirteen  young 
women  on  thirteen  white  horses.  The  girl  who  smashed 
my  knee-cap  is  to  be  Joan  of  Arc  and  ride  at  the  head  of 
'em.  In  armour.  Fact.  There's  to  be  a  banquet  for  'em 
at  the  Imperial  at  nine.  We  can't  stop  that.  And  they'll 
process  down  the  Embankment  and  down  Pall  Mall  and 
Piccadilly  at  eleven ;  but  they  won't  process  here.  We've 
let  'em  out  an  hour  too  soon." 

A  policeman  came  from  the  prison-yard.  He  blew  a 
whistle.  Four  taxi-cabs  crept  round  the  corner  furtively, 
driven  by  visibly  hilarious  chauffeurs. 

"  The  triumphant  procession  from  Holloway,"  said  the 
Cabinet  Minister,  "  is  you  and  me,  sir,  and  those  taxi- 
cabs." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  211 

On  the  other  side  of  the  gates  a  woman  laughed.  The 
released    prisoners    were   coming   down   the   prison-yard. 

The  Cabinet  Minister  cranked  up  his  engine  with  an 
unctuous  glee.  He  was  boyishly  happy  because  he  and 
the  Home  Secretary  had  done  them  out  of  the  Car  of 
Victory  and  the  thirteen  white  horses. 

The  prison-gates  opened.  The  Cabinet  Minister  and 
Drayton  raised  their  caps. 

The  leaders,  Mrs.  Blathwaite  and  Angela  Blathwaite 
and  Mrs.  Palmerston-Swete  came  first.  Then  Lady  Vic- 
toria Threlfall.  Then  Dorothea.  Then  sixteen  other 
women. 

Drayton  did  not  look  at  them.  He  did  not  see  what 
happened  when  the  Cabinet  Minister  met  his  wife.  He 
did  not  see  the  sixteen  other  women.  He  saw  nothing  but 
Dorothea  walking  by  herself. 

She  had  no  hat  on.  Her  clothes  were  as  the  great  raid 
had  left  them,  a  month  ago.  Her  serge  coat  was  torn  at 
the  breast  pocket,  the  three-cornered  flap  hung,  showing 
the  white  lining.  Another  three-cornered  flap  hung  from 
her  right  knee.  She  carried  her  small,  hawk-like  head 
alert  and  high.  Her  face  had  the  incomparable  bloom  of 
youth.  Her  eyes  shone.  They  and  her  face  showed  no 
memory  of  the  prison-cell,  the  plank-bed,  and  the  prison 
walls ;  they  showed  no  sense  of  Drayton's  decency  in  com- 
ing to  meet  her,  no  sense  of  anything  at  all  but  of  the 
queerness,  the  greatness  and  the  glory  of  the  world  —  of 
him,  perhaps,  as  a  part  of  it.  She  stepped  into  the  car  as 
if  they  had  met  by  appointment  for  a  run  into  the  country. 

"  I  shan't  hurt  your  car.  I'm  quite  clean,  though  you 
mightn't  think  it.     The  cells  were  all  right  this  time." 


212  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

He  disapproved  of  her,  yet  be  adored  her. 

"  Dorothy,"  he  said,  "  do  you  want  to  go  to  that  ban- 
quet ?  " 

"  No,  but  I've  got  to.  I  must  go  through  with  it.  I 
swore  I'd  do  the  thing  completely  or  not  at  all." 

"  It  isn't  till  nine.  We've  three  whole  hours  before  we 
need  start." 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do  with  me  ?  " 

"  I'm  going  to  take  you  home  first.  Then  I  suppose  I 
shall  have  to  drive  you  down  to  that  beastly  banquet." 

"  That  won't  take  three  and  a  half  hours.  It's  a  heav- 
enly morning.     Can't  we  do  something  with  it  ?  " 

"  What  would  you  like  to  do  ?  " 

"  I'd  like  to  stop  at  the  nearest  coffee-stall.  I'm  hungry. 
Then  —  Are  you  frightfully  sleepy  ?  " 

"  Me  ?     Oh,  Lord,  no."   * 

"  Then  let's  go  off  somewhere  into  the  country." 

They  went. 


They  pulled  up  in  a  green  lane  near  Totteridge  to  finish 
the  buns  they  had  brought  with  them  from  the  coffee-stall. 

"  Did  you  ever  smell  anything  like  this  lane  ?  Did  you 
ever  eat  anything  like  these  buns?  Did  you  ever  drink 
anything  like  that  divine  coffee?  If  epicures  had  any 
imagination  they'd  go  out  and  obstruct  policemen  and  get 
put  in  prison  for  the  sake  of  the  sensations  they'd  have 
afterwards." 

"  That  reminds  me,"  he  said,  "  that  I  want  to  talk  to 
you.     No  —  but  seriously." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  213 

"  I  don't  mind  how  seriously  you  talk  if  I  may  go  on 
eating." 

"  That's  what  I  brought  the  buns  for.  So  that  I  mayn't 
be  interrupted.  First  of  all  I  want  to  tell  you  that  you 
haven't  taken  me  in.  Other  people  may  be  impressed 
with  this  Holloway  business,  but  not  me.  I'm  not  moved, 
or  touched,  or  even  interested." 

"  Still,"  she  murmured,  "  you  did  get  up  at  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning." 

"  If  you  think  I  got  up  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning 
to  show  my  sympathy,  you're  mistaken." 

"  Sympathy  ?  I  don't  need  your  sympathy.  It  was 
worth  it,  Frank.  There  isn't  anything  on  earth  like  com- 
ing out  of  prison.     Unless  it  is  going  in." 

"  That  won't  work,  Dorothy,  when  I  know  why  you 
went  in.  It  wasn't  to  prove  your  principles.  Your  prin- 
ciples were  against  that  sort  of  thing.  It  wasn't  to  get 
votes  for  women.  You  know  as  well  as  I  do  that  you'll 
never  get  them  that  way.  It  wasn't  to  annoy  Mr.  As- 
quith.  You  knew  Mr.  Asquith  wouldn't  care  a  hang.  It 
was  to  annoy  me." 

"  I  wonder,"  she  said  dreamily,  "  if  I  shall  ever  be 
able  to  stop  eating." 

"  You  can't  take  me  in.  I  know  too  much  about  it. 
You  said  you  were  going  to  keep  out  of  rows.  You 
weren't  going  on  that  deputation  because  it  meant  a  row. 
You  went  because  I  asked  you  not  to  go." 

"  I  did ;  and  I  should  go  again  tomorrow  for  the  same 
reason." 

"  But  it  isn't  a  reason.     It's  not  as  if  I'd  asked  you  to 


214  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

go  against  your  conscience.  Your  conscience  hadn't  any- 
thing to  do  with  it." 

"  Oh,  hadn't  it !  I  went  because  you'd  no  right  to  ask 
me  not  to." 

"  If  I'd  had  the  right  you'd  have  gone  just  the  same." 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  the  right  ?  " 

"  You  know  perfectly  well  what  I  mean." 

"  Of  course  I  do.  You  mean,  and  you  meant  that  if 
I'd  married  you  you'd  have  had  the  right,  not  just  to  ask 
me  not  to,  but  to  prevent  me.  That  was  what  I  was  out 
against.  I'd  be  out  against  it  tomorrow  and  the  next  day, 
and  for  as  long  as  you  keep  up  that  attitude." 

"  And  yet  —  you  said  you  loved  me." 

"  So  I  did.     So  I  do.     But  I'm  out  against  that  too." 

"  Good  Lord,  against  what  ?  " 

"  Against  your  exploiting  my  love  for  your  purposes." 

"  My  poor  dear  child,  what  do  you  suppose  I  wanted  ?  " 

She  had  reached  the  uttermost  limit  of  absurdity,  and 
in  that  moment  she  became  to  him  helpless  and  pathetic. 

"  I  knew  there  was  going  to  be  the  most  infernal  row 
and  I  wanted  to  keep  you  out  of  it.  Look  here,  you'd 
have  thought  me  a  rotter  if  I  hadn't,  wouldn't  you  ? 

"  Of  course  you  would.  And  there's  another  thing. 
You  weren't  straight  about  it.  You  never  told  me  you 
were  going." 

"  I  never  told  you  I  wasn't." 

"  I  don't  care,  Dorothy ;  you  weren't  straight.  You 
ought  to  have  told  me." 

"  How  could  I  tell  you  when  I  knew  you'd  only  go  try- 
ing to  stop  me  and  getting  yourself  arrested." 

"  Not  me.     They  wouldn't  have  touched  me." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  215 

"  How  was  I  to  know  that  ?  If  they  had  I  should  have 
dished  you.  And  I'd  have  stayed  away  rather  than  do 
that.  I  didn't  tell  Michael  or  Nicky  or  Father  for  the 
same  reason." 

"  You'd  have  stayed  at  home  rather  than  have  dished 
me  ?     Do  you  really  mean  that  ?  " 

"  Of  course  I  mean  it.  And  I  meant  it.  It's  you," 
she  said,  "  who  don't  care." 

"  How  do  you  make  that  out  ?  " 

He  really  wanted  to  know.  He  really  wanted,  if  it 
were  possible,  to  understand  her. 

"  I  make  it  out  this  way.  Here  have  I  been  through  the 
adventure  and  the  experience  of  my  life.  I  was  in  the 
thick  of  the  big  raid;  I  was  four  weeks  shut  up  in  a 
prison  cell;  and  you  don't  care;  you're  not  interested. 
You  never  said  to  yourself,  '  Dorothy  was  in  the  big  raid, 
I  wonder  what  happened  to  her  ? '  or  '  Dorothy's  in 
prison,  I  wonder  how  she's  feeling  ? '  You  didn't  care ; 
you  weren't  interested. 

"  If  it  had  happened  to  you,  I  couldn't  have  thought  of 
anything  else,  I  couldn't  have  got  it  out  of  my  head.  I 
should  have  been  wondering  all  the  time  what  you  were 
feeling;  I  couldn't  have  rested  till  I  knew.  It  would 
have  been  as  if  I  was  in  prison  myself.  And  now,  when 
I've  come  out,  all  you  think  of  is  how  you  can  rag  and 
score   off  me." 

She  was  sitting  beside  him  on  the  green  bank  of  the 
lane.  Her  hands  were  clasped  round  her  knees.  One 
knickerbockered  knee  protruded  through  the  three- 
cornered  rent  in  her  skirt;  she  stared  across  the  road,  a 
long,  straight  stare  that  took  no  heed  of  what  she  saw,  the 


216  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

grey  road,  and  the  green  bank  on  the  other  side,  topped 
by  its  hedge  of  trees. 

Her  voice  sounded  quiet  in  the  quiet  lane;  it  had  no 
accent  of  self-pity  or  reproach.  It  was  as  if  she  were 
making  statements  that  had  no  emotional  significance 
whatever. 

She  did  not  mean  to  hurt  him,  yet  every  word  cut  where 
he  was  sorest. 

"  I  wanted  to  tell  you  about  it.  I  counted  the  days, 
the  minutes  till  I  could  tell  you ;  but  you  wouldn't  listen. 
You  don't  want  to  hear." 

"  I  won't  listen  if  it's  about  women's  suffrage.     And  I 
don't  want  to  hear  if  it's  anything  awful  about  you." 
"  It  is  about  me,  but  it  isn't  awful. 
"  That's  what  I  want  to  tell  you. 

"  But,  first  of  all  —  about  the  raid.  I  didn't  mean  to 
be  in  it  at  all,  as  it  happens.  I  meant  to  go  with  the 
deputation  because  you  told  me  not  to.  You're  right 
about  that.  But  I  meant  to  turn  back  as  soon  as  the 
police  stopped  us,  because  I  hate  rows  with  the  police,  and 
because  I  don't  believe  in  them,  and  because  I  told  An- 
gela Blathwaite  I  wasn't  going  in  with  her  crowd  any  way. 
You  see,  she  called  me  a  coward  before  a  lot  of  people  and 
said  I  funked  it.  So  I  did.  But  I  should  have  been  a 
bigger  coward  if  I'd  gone  against  my  own  will,  just  be- 
cause of  what  she  said.  That's  how  she  collars  heaps  of 
women.  They  adore  her  and  they're  afraid  of  her. 
Sometimes  they  lie  and  tell  her  they're  going  in  when 
their  moment  comes,  knowing  perfectly  well  that  they're 
not  going  in  at  all.  I  don't  adore  her,  and  I'm  not  afraid 
of  her,  and  I  didn't  lie. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  217 

"  So  I  went  at  the  tail  of  the  deputation  where  I  could 
slip  out  when  the  row  began.  I  swear  I  didn't  mean  to  be 
in  it.  I  funked  it  far  too  much.  I  didn't  mind  the  po- 
lice and  I  didn't  mind  the  crowd.  But  I  funked  being 
with  the  women.  When  I  saw  their  faces.  You  would 
have  funked  it. 

"  And  anyhow  I  don't  like  doing  things  in  a  beastly 
body.     Ugh ! 

"  And  then  they  began  moving. 

"  The  police  tried  to  stop  them.  And  the  crowd  tried. 
The  crowd  began  jeering  at  them.  And  still  they  moved. 
And  the  mounted  police  horses  got  excited,  and  danced 
about  and  reared  a  bit,  and  the  crowd  was  in  a  funk 
then  and  barged  into  the  women.     That  was  rather  awful. 

"  I  could  have  got  away  then  if  I'd  chosen.  There  was 
a  man  close  to  me  all  the  time  who  kept  making  spaces 
for  me  and  telling  me  to  slip  through.  I  was  just  going 
to  when  a  woman  fell.  Somewhere  in  the  front  of  the 
deputation  where  the  police  were  getting  nasty. 

"  Then  I  had  to  stay.  I  had  to  go  on  with  them.  I 
swear  I  wasn't  excited  or  carried  away  in  the  least.  Two 
women  near  me  were  yelling  at  the  police.  I  hated  them. 
But  I  felt  I'd  be  an  utter  brute  if  I  left  them  and  got  off 
safe.  You  see,  it  was  an  ugly  crowd,  and  things  were  be- 
ginning to  be  jolly  dangerous,  and  I'd  funked  it  badly. 
Only  the  first  minute.  It  went  —  the  funk  I  mean  — 
when  I  saw  the  woman  go  down.  She  fell  sort  of  slanting 
through  the  crowd,  and  it  was  horrible.  I  couldn't  have 
left  them  then  any  more  than  I  could  have  left  children  in 
a  burning  house. 

"  I  thought  of  you." 


2i8  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  You  thought  of  uie  ?  " 

"  Yes.  I  thought  of  you  —  how  you'd  have  hated  it. 
But  I  didn't  care.  I  was  sort  of  boosted  up  above  caring. 
The  funk  had  all  gone  and  I  was  ab-so-lutely  happy.  Not 
insanely  happy  like  some  of  the  other  women,  but  quietly, 
comfily  happy. 

"  After  all,  I  didn't  do  anything  you  need  have 
minded." 

"  What  did  you  do  ?  "  he  said. 

"  I  just  went  on  and  stood  still  and  refused  to  go  back. 
I  stuck  my  hands  in  my  pockets  so  that  I  shouldn't  let 
out  at  a  policeman  or  anything  (I  knew  you  wouldn't 
like  that).  I  may  have  pushed  a  bit  now  and  then  with 
my  shoulders  and  my  elbows ;  I  can't  remember.  But  I 
didn't  make  one  sound.  I  was  perfectly  lady-like  and  per- 
fectly dignified." 

"  I  suppose  you  know  you  haven't  got  a  hat  on  ?  " 

"  It  didn't  come  off.  I  took  it  off  and  threw  it  to  the 
crowd  when  the  row  began.  It  doesn't  matter  about  your 
hair  coming  down  if  you  haven't  got  a  hat  on,  but  if  your 
hair's  down  and  your  hat's  bashed  in  and  all  crooked  you 
look  a  perfect  idiot. 

"  It  wasn't  a  bad  fight,  you  know,  twenty-one  women 
to  I  don't  know  how  many  policemen,  and  the  front  ones 
got  right  into  the  doorway  of  St.  Stephen's.  That  was 
where  they  copped  me. 

"  But  that  isn't  the  end  of  it. 

"  The  fight  was  only  the  first  part  of  the  adventure. 
The  wonderful  thing  was  what  happened  afterwards.  In 
prison. 

"  I  didn't  think  I'd  really  like  prison.     That  was  an- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  219 

other  thing  I  funked.  I'd  heard  such  awful  things  about 
it,  about  the  dirt,  you  know.  And  there  wasn't  any  dirt 
in  my  cell,  anyhow.  And  after  the  crowds  of  women, 
after  the  meetings  and  the  speeches,  the  endless  talking 
and  the  boredom,  that  cell  was  like  heaven. 

"  Thank  God,  it's  always  solitary  confinement.  The 
Government  doesn't  know  that  if  they  want  to  make  prison 
a  deterrent  they'll  shut  us  up  together.  You  won't  give 
the  Home  Secretary  the  tip,  will  you  ? 

"  But  that  isn't  what  I  wanted  to  tell  you  about. 

"  It  was  something  bigger,  something  tremendous. 
You'll  not  believe  this  part  of  it,  but  I  was  absolutely 
happy  in  that  cell.  It  was  a  sort  of  deep-down  unexcited 
happiness.  I'm  not  a  bit  religious,  but  I  know  how  the 
nuns  feel  in  their  cells  when  they've  given  up  everything 
and  shut  themselves  up  with  God.  The  cell  was  like  a 
convent  cell,  you  know,  as  narrow  as  that  bit  of  shadow 
there  is,  and  it  had  nice  white-washed  walls,  and  a  planked- 
bed  in  the  corner,  and  a  window  high,  high  up.  There 
ought  to  have  been  a  crucifix  on  the  wall  above  the  plank- 
bed,  but  there  wasn't  a  crucifix.  There  was  only  a  shiny 
black  Bible  on  the  chair. 

"  Really  Frank,  if  you're  to  be  shut  up  for  a  month  with 
just  one  book,  it  had  better  be  the  Bible.  Isaiah's  rip- 
ping. I  can  remember  heaps  of  it :  '  in  the  habitation  of 
jackals,  where  they  lay,  shall  be  grass  with  reeds  and 
rushes.  And  an  highway  shall  be  there  .  .  .  the  redeemed 
shall  walk  there:  and  the  ransomed  of  the  Lord  shall  re- 
turn with  singing  into  Zion  '  .  .  .  '  They  that  wait  upon 
the  Lord  shall  renew  their  strength ;  they  shall  mount  up 
with  wings  as  eagles ;  they  shall  run,  and  not  be  weary ; 


220  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

they  shall  walk,  and  not  faint.'  I  used  to  read  like  any- 
thing; and  I  thought  of  things.  They  sort  of  came  to 
me. 

"  That's  what  I  wanted  to  tell  you  about.  The  things 
that  came  to  me  were  so  much  bigger  than  the  thing  I  went 
in  for.  I  could  see  all  along  we  weren't  going  to  get  it 
that  way.  And  I  knew  we  were  going  to  get  it  some 
other  way.  I  don't  in  the  least  know  how,  but  it'll  be  some 
big,  tremendous  way  that'll  make  all  this  fighting  and 
fussing  seem  the  rottenest  game.  That  was  one  of  the 
things  I  used  to  think  about." 

"  Then,"  he  said,  "  you've  given  it  up  ?  You're  com- 
ing out  of  it  ?  " 

She  looked  at  him  keenly.  "  Are  those  still  your  con- 
ditions ?  " 

He  hesitated  one  second  before  he  answered  firmly. 
"  Yes,  those  are  still  my  conditions.  You  still  won't  agree 
to  them  ?  " 

"  I  still  won't  agree.  It's  no  use  talking  about  it.  You 
don't  believe  in  freedom.  We're  incompatible.  We  don't 
stand  for  the  same  ideals." 

"  Oh,  Lord,  what  does  that  matter  ?  " 

"  It  matters  most  awfully." 

"  I  should  have  thought,"  said  Drayton,  "  it  would  have 
mattered  more  if  I'd  had  revolting  manners  or  an  im- 
pediment in  my  speech  or  something." 

"  It  wouldn't,  really." 

"  Well,  you  seem  to  have  thought  about  a  lot  of  things. 
Did  you  ever  once  think  about  me,  Dorothy  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  did.  nave  you  ever  read  the  Psalms  ? 
There's  a  jolly  one  that  begins :     '  Blessed  be  the  Lord  my 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  221 

strength,  which  teacheth  my  hands  to  war  and  my  fingers 
to  fight.'  I  used  to  think  of  you  when  I  read  that.  I 
thought  of  you  a  lot. 

"  That's  what  I  was  coming  to.  It  was  the  queerest 
thing  of  all.  Everything  seemed  ended  when  I  went  to 
prison.  I  knew  you  wouldn't  care  for  me  after  what  I'd 
done  —  you  must  really  listen  to  this,  Frank  —  I  knew 
you  couldn't  and  wouldn't  marry  me;  and  it  somehow 
didn't  matter.  What  I'd  got  hold  of  was  bigger  than  that. 
I  knew  that  all  this  Women's  Suffrage  business  was  only 
a  part  of  it,  a  small,  ridiculous  part. 

"  I  sort  of  saw  the  redeemed  of  the  Lord.  They  were 
men,  as  well  as  women,  Frank.  And  they  were  all  free. 
They  were  all  free  because  they  were  redeemed.  And 
the  funny  thing  was  that  you  were  part  of  it.  You  were 
mixed  up  in  the  whole  queer,  tremendous  business. 
Everything  was  ended.  And  everything  was  begun;  so 
that  I  knew  you  understood  even  when  you  didn't  under- 
stand. It  was  really  as  if  I'd  got  you  tight,  somehow; 
and  I  knew  you  couldn't  go,  even  when  you'd  gone." 

"  And  yet  you  don't  see  that  it's  a  crime  to  force  me  to 
go." 

"  I  see  that  it  would  be  a  worse  crime  to  force  you  to 
stay  if  you  mean  going. 

"  What  time  is  it  ?  " 

"  A  quarter  to  eight." 

"  And  I've  got  to  go  home  and  have  a  bath.  Whatever 
you  do,  don't  make  me  late  for  that  infernal  banquet. 
You  are  going  to  drive  me  there  ?  " 

"  I'm  going  to  drive  you  there,  but  I'm  not  going  in 
with  you." 


222  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Poor  darling !     Did  I  ask  you  to  go  in  ?  " 

He  drove  her  back  to  her  father's  house.  She  came  out 
of  it  burnished  and  beautiful,  dressed  in  clean  white 
linen,  with  the  broad  red,  white  and  blue  tricolour 
of  the  Women's  Franchise  Union  slanting  across  her 
breast. 

He  drove  her  to  the  Banquet  of  the  Prisoners,  to  the 
Imperial  Hotel,  Kingsway.  They  went  in  silence;  for 
their  hearts  ached  too  much  for  speaking.  But  in  Dor- 
othy's heart,  above  the  aching,  there  was  that  queer  ex- 
altation that  had  sustained  her  in  prison. 

He  left  her  at  the  entrance  of  the  hotel,  where  Michael 
and  Nicholas  waited  to  receive  her. 

Michael  and  Nicholas  went  in  with  her  to  the  Banquet. 
They  hated  it,  but  they  went  in. 

Veronica  was  with  them.  She  too  wore  a  white  frock, 
with  red,  white  and  blue  ribbons. 

"  Drayton's  a  bit  of  a  rotter,"  Michael  said,  "  not  to 
see  you  through." 

"  How  can  he  when  he  feels  like  that  about  it  %  " 

"  As  if  we  didn't  feel !  " 


Three  hundred  and  thirty  women  and  twenty  men 
waited  in  the  Banquet  Hall  to  receive  the  prisoners. 

The  high  galleries  were  festooned  with  the  red,  white 
and  blue  of  the  Women's  Franchise  Union,  and  hung  with 
flags  and  blazoned  banners.  The  silk  standards  and  the 
emblems  of  the  Women's  Suffrage  Leagues  and  Societies, 
supported  by  their  tall  poles,  stood  ranged  along  three 
walls.     They  covered  the  sham  porphyry  with  gorgeous 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  223 

and  heroic  colours,  purple  and  blue,  sky-blue  and  sapphire 
blue  and  royal  blue,  black,  white  and  gold,  vivid  green,  pure 
gold,  pure  white,  dead-black,  orange  and  scarlet  and 
magenta. 

From  the  high  table  under  the  windows  streamed  seven 
dependent  tables  decorated  with  nosegays  of  red,  white 
and  blue  flowers.  In  the  centre  of  the  high  table  three 
arm-chairs,  draped  with  the  tricolour,  were  set  like  three 
thrones  for  the  three  leaders.  They  were  flanked  by  nine 
other  chairs  on  the  right  and  nine  on  the  left  for  the 
eighteen  other  prisoners. 

There  was  a  slight  rustling  sound  at  the  side  door  lead- 
ing to  the  high  table.  It  was  followed  by  a  thicker  and 
more  prolonged  sound  of  rustling  as  the  three  hundred  and 
fifty  turned  in  their  places. 

The  twenty-one  prisoners  came  in. 

A  great  surge  of  white,  spotted  with  red  and  blue, 
heaved  itself  up  in  the  hall  to  meet  them  as  the  three 
hundred  and  fifty  rose  to  their  feet. 

And  from  the  three  hundred  and  fifty  there  went  up  a 
strange,  a  savage  and  a  piercing  collective  sound,  where  a 
clear  tinkling  as  of  glass  or  thin  metal,  and  a  tearing  as 
of  silk,  and  a  crying  as  of  children  and  of  small,  slender- 
throated  animals  were  held  together  by  ringing,  vibrating, 
overtopping  tones  as  of  violins  playing  in  the  treble.  And 
now  a  woman's  voice  started  off  on  its  own  note  and  tore 
the  delicate  tissue  of  this  sound  with  a  solitary  scream; 
and  now  a  man's  voice  filled  up  a  pause  in  the  shrill  hur- 
rahing with  a  solitary  boom. 

To  Dorothea,  in  her  triumphal  seat  at  Angela  Blath- 
■waite's  right  hand,  to  Michael  and  Nicholas  and  Veronica 


224  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

in  their  places  among  the  crowd,  that  collective  sound  was 
frightful. 

From  her  high  place  Dorothea  could  see  Michael  and 
Nicholas,  one  on  each  side  of  Veronica,  just  below  her. 
At  the  same  table,  facing  them,  she  saw  her  three  aunts, 
Louie,  Emmeline  and  Edith. 

It  was  from  Emmeline  that  those  lacerating  screams 
arose. 


The  breakfast  and  the  speeches  of  the  prisoners  were 
over.  The  crowd  was  on  its  feet  again,  and  the  prisoners 
had  risen  in  their  high  places. 

Out  of  the  three  hundred  and  seventy-one,  two  hun- 
dred and  seventy-nine  women  and  seven  men  were  sing- 
ing the  Marching  Song  of  the  Militant  Women. 

Shoulder  to  shoulder,  breast  to  breast, 
Our  army  moves  from  east  to  west. 
Follow  on!     Follow  on! 

With  flag  and  sword  from  south  and  north, 
The  sounding,  shining  hosts  go  forth. 
Follow  on!     Follow  on! 

Do  you  not  hear  our  marching  feet, 
From  door  to  door,  from  street  to  street? 
Follow  on!      Follow  on! 

Dorothea  was  fascinated  and  horrified  by  the  sing- 
ing, swaying,  excited  crowd. 

Her  three  aunts  fascinated  her.  They  were  all  singing 
at  the  top  of  their  voices.  Aunt  Louie  stood  up  straight 
and  rigid.     She  sang  from  the  back  of  her  throat,  through 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  225 

a  mouth  not  quite  sufficiently  open ;  she  sang  with  a  grim, 
heroic  determination  to  sing,  whatever  it  might  cost  her 
and  other  people. 

Aunt  Edie  sang  inaudibly,  her  thin  shallow  voice,  doing 
its  utmost,  was  overpowered  by  the  collective  song.  Aunt 
Emmeline  sang  shrill  and  loud;  her  body  rocked  slightly 
to  the  rhythm  of  a  fantastic  march.  With  one  large, 
long  hand  raised  she  beat  the  measure  of  the  music.  Her 
head  was  thrown  back;  and  on  her  face  there  was  a  look 
of  ecstasy,  of  a  holy  rapture,  exalted,  half  savage,  not 
quite  sane. 

Dorothea  was  fascinated  and  horrified  by  Aunt  Em- 
meline. 

The  singing  had  threatened  her  when  it  began ;  so  that 
she  felt  again  her  old  terror  of  the  collective  soul.  Its 
massed  emotion  threatened  her.  She  longed  for  her  white- 
washed prison-cell,  for  its  hardness,  its  nakedness,  its 
quiet,  its  visionary  peace.  She  tried  to  remember.  Her 
soul,  in  its  danger,  tried  to  get  back  there.  But  the  soul 
of  the  crowd  in  the  hall  below  her  swelled  and  heaved 
itself  towards  her,  drawn  by  the  Vortex.  She  felt  the 
rushing  of  the  whirlwind;  it  sucked  at  her  breath:  the 
Vortex  was  drawing  her,  too;  the  powerful,  abominable 
thing  almost  got  her.     The  sight  of  Emmeline  saved  her. 

She  might  have  been  singing  and  swaying  too,  carried 
away  in  the  same  awful  ecstasy,  if  she  had  not  seen 
Emmeline.  By  looking  at  Emmeline  she  saved  her  soul; 
it  stood  firm  again ;  she  was  clear  and  hard  and  sane. 

She  could  look  away  from  Emmeline  now.  She  saw 
her  brothers,  Michael  and  Nicholas.  Michael's  soul  was 
the  prey  of  its  terror  of  the  herd-soul.     The  shrill  voices, 


226  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

fine  as  whipcord  and  sharp  as  needles,  tortured  him. 
Michael  looked  beautiful  in  his  martyrdom.  His  fair, 
handsome  face  was  set  clear  and  hard.  His  yellow  hair, 
with  its  hard  edges,  fitted  his  head  like  a  cap  of  solid, 
polished  metal.  Weariness  and  disgust  made  a  sort  of 
cloud  over  his  light  green  eyes.  When  Nicky  looked  at 
him  Nicky's  face  twitched  and  twinkled.  But  he  hated 
it  almost  as  much  as  Michael  hated  it. 

She  thought  of  Michael  and  Nicholas.  They  hated 
it,  and  yet  they  stuck  it  out.  They  wouldn't  go  back  on 
her.  She  and  Lady  Victoria  Threlfall  were  to  march  on 
foot  before  the  Car  of  Victory  from  Blackfriars  Bridge 
along  the  Embankment,  through  Trafalgar  Square  and 
Pall  Mall  and  Piccadilly  to  Hyde  Park  Corner.  And 
Michael  and  Nicholas  would  march  beside  them  to  hold 
up  the  poles  of  the  standard  which,  after  all,  they  were 
not  strong  enough  to  carry. 

She  thought  of  Drayton  who  had  not  stuck  it  out.  And 
at  the  same  time  she  thought  of  the  things  that  had  come 
to  her  in  her  prison  cell.  She  had  told  him  the  most  real 
thing  that  had  ever  happened  to  her,  and  he  had  not 
listened.  He  had  not  cared.  Michael  would  have 
listened.     Michael  would  have  cared  intensely. 

She  thought,  "  '  I  am  not  come  to  bring  peace,  but  a 
sword.' '      The  sword  was  between  her  and  her  lover. 

She  had  given  him  up.  She  had  chosen,  not  between 
him  and  the  Vortex,  but  between  him  and  her  vision 
which  was  more  than  either  of  them  or  than  all  this. 

She  looked  at  Rosalind  and  Maud  Blackadder  who  sang 
violently  in  the  hall  below  her.  She  had  chosen  free- 
dom.    She    had    given    up    her    lover.     She    wondered 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  227 

whether  Rosalind  or  the  Blackadder  girl  could  have  done 
as  much,  supposing  they  had  had  a  choice  ? 

Then  she  looked  at  Veronica. 

Veronica  was  standing  between  Michael  and  Nicholas. 
She  was  slender  and  beautiful  and  pure,  like  some  sacri- 
ficial virgin.  Presently  she  would  be  marching  in  the 
Procession.  She  would  carry  a  thin,  tall  pole,  with  a 
round  olive  wreath  on  the  top  of  it,  and  a  white  dove 
sitting  in  the  ring  of  the  olive  wreath.  And  she  would 
look  as  if  she  was  not  in  the  Procession  but  in  another 
place. 

When  Dorothea  looked  at  her  she  was  lifted  up  above 
the  insane  ecstasy  and  the  tumult  of  the  herd-soul.  Her 
soul  and  the  soul  of  Veronica  went  alone  in  utter  freedom. 

Follow  on!      Follow  on! 

For  Faith's  our  spear  and  Hope's  our  sword, 
And  Love's  our  mighty  battle-lord. 
Follow  on!      Follow  on! 

And  Justice  is  our  flag  unfurled, 
The  flaming  flag  that  sweeps  the  world. 
Follow  on !      Follow  on ! 

And  "  Freedom !  "  is  our  battle-cry ; 
For  Freedom  we  will  fight  and  die. 
Follow  on!      Follow  on! 

The  Procession  was  over  a  mile  long. 

It  stretched  all  along  the  Embankment  from  Black- 
friar's  Bridge  to  Westminster.  The  Car  of  Victory,  cov- 
ered with  the  tricolour,  and  the  Bodyguard  on  thirteen 
white  horses  were  drawn  up  beside  Cleopatra's  Needle  and 
the  Sphinxes. 


228  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Before  the  Car  of  Victory,  from  the  western  Sphinx  to 
Northumberland  Avenue,  were  the  long  regiments  of  the 
Unions  and  Societies  and  Leagues,  of  the  trades  and 
the  professions  and  the  arts,  carrying  their  banners,  the 
purple  and  the  blue,  the  black,  white  and  gold,  the  green, 
the  orange  and  the  scarlet  and  magenta. 

Behind  the  Car  of  Victory  came  the  eighteen  prisoners 
with  Lady  Victoria  Threlfall  and  Dorothea  at  their  head, 
under  the  immense  tricolour  standard  that  Michael  and 
Nicholas  carried  for  them.  Behind  the  prisoners,  clos- 
ing the  Procession,  was  a  double  line  of  young  girls  dressed 
in  white  with  tricolour  ribbons,  each  carrying  a  pole  with 
the  olive  wreath  and  dove,  symbolizing,  with  the  obvious- 
ness of  extreme  innocence,  the  peace  that  follows  victory. 
They  were  led  by  Veronica. 

She  did  not  know  that  she  had  been  chosen  to  lead  them 
because  of  her  youth  and  her  processional,  hieratic  beauty ; 
she  thought  that  the  Union  had  bestowed  this  honour  on 
her  because  she  belonged  to  Dorothea. 

From  her  place  at  the  head  of  the  Procession  she 
could  see  the  big  red,  white  and  blue  standard  held  high 
above  Dorothea  and  Lady  Victoria  Threlfall.  She  knew 
how  they  would  look;  Lady  Victoria,  white  and  tense, 
would  go  like  a  saint  and  a  martyr,  in  exaltation,  hardly 
knowing  where  she  was,  or  what  she  did;  and  Dorothea 
would  go  in  pride,  and  in  disdain  for  the  proceedings  in 
which  her  honour  forced  her  to  take  part ;  she  would  have 
an  awful  knowledge  of  what  she  was  doing  and  of  where 
she  was;  she  would  drink  every  drop  of  the  dreadful  cup 
she  had  poured  out  for  herself,  hating  it. 

Last  night  Veronica  had  thought  that  she  too  would  hate 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  229 

it;  she  thought  that  she  would  rather  die  than  march  in 
the  Procession.  But  she  did  not  hate  it  or  her  part  in 
it.  The  thing  was  too  beautiful  and  too  big  to  hate,  and 
her  part  in  it  was  too  little. 

She  was  not  afraid  of  the  Procession  or  of  the  soul  of 
the  Procession.  She  was  not  afraid  of  the  thick  crowd 
on  the  pavements,  pressing  closer  and  closer,  pushed  back 
continually  by  the  police.  Her  soul  was  by  itself.  Like 
Dorothea's  soul  it  went  apart  from  the  soul  of  the  crowd 
and  the  soul  of  the  Procession;  only  it  was  not  proud; 
it  was  simply  happy. 

The  band  had  not  yet  begun  to  play;  but  already  she 
heard  the  music  sounding  in  her  brain;  her  feet  felt  the 
rhythm  of  the  march. 

Somewhere  on  in  front  the  policemen  made  gestures  of 
release,  and  the  whole  Procession  began  to  move.  It 
marched  to  an  unheard  music,  to  the  rhythm  that  was  in 
Veronica's  brain. 

They  went  through  what  were  once  streets  between  walls 
of  houses,  and  were  now  broad  lanes  between  thick  walls 
of  people.  The  visible  aspect  of  things  was  slightly 
changed,  slightly  distorted.  The  houses  stood  farther 
back  behind  the  walls  of  people;  they  were  hung  with 
people;  a  swarm  of  people  clung  like  bees  to  the  house 
walls. 

All  these  people  were  fixed  where  they  stood  or  hung. 
In  a  still  and  stationary  world  the  Procession  was  the 
only  thing  that  moved. 

She  had  a  vague,  far-off  perception  that  the  crowd  was 
friendly. 

A  mounted  policeman  rode  at  her  side.     When  they 


230  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

halted  at  the  cross-streets  he  looked  down  at  Veronica  with 
an  amused  and  benign  expression.  She  had  a  vague,  far- 
off  perception  that  the  policeman  was  friendly.  Every- 
thing seemed  to  her  vague  and  far  off. 

Only  now  and  then  it  struck  her  as  odd  that  a  revolu- 
tionary Procession  should  be  allowed  to  fill  the  streets 
of  a  great  capital,  and  that  a  body  of  the  same  police  that 
arrested  the  insurgents  should  go  with  it  to  protect  them, 
to  clear  their  triumphal  way  before  them,  holding  up 
the  entire  traffic  of  great  thoroughfares  that  their  bands 
and  their  banners  and  their  regiments  should  go  through. 

She  said  to  herself  "  What  a  country !  It  couldn't  hap- 
pen in  Germany;  it  couldn't  happen  in  France,  or  any- 
where in  Europe  or  America.  It  could  only  happen  in 
England." 

Xow  they  were  going  up  St.  James's  Street  towards 
Piccadilly.     The  band  was  playing  the  Marseillaise. 

And  with  the  first  beat  of  the  drum  Veronica's  soul 
came  down  from  its  place,  and  took  part  in  the  Proces- 
sion. As  long  as  they  played  the  Marseillaise  she  felt 
that  she  could  march  with  the  Procession  to  the  ends  of 
the  world ;  she  could  march  into  battle  to  the  Marseillaise ; 
she  could  fight  to  that  music  and  die. 

The  women  behind  her  were  singing  under  their 
breath.     They  sang  the  words  of  the  Women's  Marseillaise. 

And  Veronica,  marching  in  front  of  them  by  herself, 
sang  another  song.  She  sang  the  Marseillaise  of  Heine 
and  of  Schubert. 

" '  Dann  reitet  mein  Kaiser  wohl  iibcr  mein  Grab, 
Viol'  Sclnverter  klirren  unci  blitzon; 
»)ann  steig'  ioh  powafTnot  hervor  aus  mein  Grab, — 
Den  Kaiser,  den  Kaiser  zu  schlitzen !  ' " 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  231 

The  front  of  the  Procession  lifted  as  it  went  up  Tyburn 
Hill. 

Veronica  could  not  see  Michael  and  Nicholas,  but  she 
knew  that  they  were  there.  She  knew  it  by  the  unusual 
steadiness  of  the  standard  that  they  carried.  Far  away 
westwards,  in  the  middle  and  front  of  the  Procession, 
the  purple  and  the  blue,  the  gold  and  white,  the  green, 
the  scarlet  and  orange  and  magenta  standards  rocked 
and  staggered ;  they  bent  forwards ;  they  were  flung  back- 
wards as  the  west  wind  took  them.  But  the  red,  white 
and  blue  standard  that  Michael  and  Nicholas  carried 
went  before  her,  steady  and  straight  and  high. 

And  Veronica  followed,  carrying  her  thin,  tall  pole 
with  the  olive  wreath  on  the  top  of  it,  and  the  white  dove 
sitting  in  the  ring  of  the  wreath.  She  went  with  the 
music  of  Schubert  and  Heine  sounding  in  her  soul. 


XVII 

Another  year  passed. 

Frances  was  afraid  for  Michael  now.  Michael  was 
being  drawn  in.  Because  of  his  strange  thoughts  he  was 
the  one  of  all  her  children  who  had  most  hidden  himself 
from  her;  who  would  perhaps  hide  himself  from  her  to 
the  very  end. 

Nicholas  had  settled  down.  He  had  left  the  Morss 
Company  and  gone  into  his  father's  business  for  a  while, 
to  see  whether  he  could  stand  it.  John  was  going  into  the 
business  too  when  he  left  Oxford.  John  was  even  looking 
forward  to  his  partnership  in  what  he  called  "  the  Pater's 
old  tree-game."  He  said,  "  You  wait  till  I  get  my  hand 
well  in.     Won't  we  make  it  rip !  " 

John  was  safe.  You  could  depend  on  him  to  keep  out 
of  trouble.  He  had  no  genius  for  adventure.  He  would 
never  strike  out  for  himself  any  strange  or  dangerous 
line.  He  had  settled  down  at  Cheltenham ;  he  had  settled 
down  at  Oxford. 

And  Dorothea  had  settled  down. 

The  Women's  Franchise  Union  was  now  in  the  full  whirl 
of  its  revolution.  Under  the  inspiring  leadership  of  the 
Blathwaites  it  ran  riot  up  and  down  the  country.  It 
smashed  windows;  it  hurled  stone  ginger-beer  bottles  into 
the  motor  cars  of  Cabinet  Ministers ;  it  poured  treacle 
into  pillar-boxes;  it  invaded  the  House  of  Commons  by 
the  water-way,  in  barges,  from  which  women,  armed  with 

232 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  233 

megaphones,  demanded  the  vote  from  infamous  legislators 
drinking  tea  on  the  Terrace;  it  went  up  in  balloons  and 
showered  down  propaganda  on  the  City;  now  and  then, 
just  to  show  what  violence  it  could  accomplish  if  it  liked, 
it  burned  down  a  house  or  two  in  a  pure  and  consecrated 
ecstasy  of  Feminism.  It  was  bringing  to  perfection  its 
last  great  tactical  manoeuvre,  the  massed  raid  followed  by 
the  hunger-strike  in  prison.  And  it  was  considering  seri- 
ously the  very  painful  but  possible  necessity  of  inter- 
fering with  British  sport  —  say  the  Eton  and  Harrow 
Match  at  Lord's  —  in  some  drastic  and  terrifying  way 
that  would  bring  the  men  of  England  to  their  senses. 

And  Dorothea's  soul  had  swung  away  from  the  sweep 
of  the  whirlwind.  It  would  never  suck  her  in.  She 
worked  now  in  the  office  of  the  Social  Reform  Union,  and 
wrote  reconstructive  articles  for  The  New  Commonwealth 
on  Economics  and  the  Marriage  Laws. 

Frances  was  not  afraid  for  her  daughter.  She  knew 
that  the  revolution  was  all  in  Dorothea's  brain. 

When  she  said  that  Michael  was  being  drawn  in  she 
meant  that  he  was  being  drawn  into  the  vortex  of  revolu- 
tionary Art.  And  since  Frances  confused  this  move- 
ment with  the  movements  of  Phyllis  Desmond  she  judged 
it  to  be  terrible.  She  understood  from  Michael  that  it 
was  the  Vortex,  the  only  one  that  really  mattered,  and 
the  only  one  that  would  ever  do  anything. 

And  Michael  was  not  only  in  it,  he  was  in  it  with 
Lawrence  Stephen. 

Though  Frances  knew  now  that  Lawrence  Stephen  had 
plans  for  Michael,  she  did  not  realize  that  they  depended 
much  more  on  Michael  himself  than  on  him.     Stephen 


234  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

had  said  that  if  Michael  was  good  enough  he  meant  to 
help  him.  If  his  poems  amounted  to  anything  he  would 
publish  them  in  his  Review.  If  any  book  of  Michael's 
poems  amounted  to  anything  he  would  give  a  whole  article 
to  that  book  in  his  Review.  If  Michael's  prose  should 
ever  amount  to  anything  he  would  give  him  regular  work 
on  the  Review. 

In  nineteen-thirteen  Michael  Harrison  was  the  most 
promising  of  the  revolutionary  young  men  who  sur- 
rounded Lawrence  Stephen,  and  his  poems  were  begin- 
ning to  appear,  one  after  another,  in  the  Green  Review. 
He  had  brought  out  a  volume  of  his  experiments  in  the 
spring  of  that  year;  they  were  better  than  those  that 
Keveillaud  had  approved  of  two  years  ago ;  and  Lawrence 
Stephen  had  praised  them  in  the  Green  Review. 

Lawrence  Stephen  was  the  only  editor  "  out  of  Ire- 
land," as  he  said,  who  would  have  had  the  courage  either 
to  publish  them  or  to  praise  them. 

And  when  Frances  realized  Michael's  dependence  on 
Lawrence  Stephen  she  was  afraid. 

"  You  wouldn't  be,  my  dear,  if  you  knew  Larry,"  Vera 
said. 

For  Frances  still  refused  to  recognize  the  man  who 
bad  taken  Ferdinand  Cameron's  place. 


Lawrence  Stephen  was  one  of  those  Nationalist  Irish- 
men who  love  Ireland  with  a  passion  that  satisfies  neither 
the  lover  nor  the  beloved.  It  was  a  pure  and  holy  pas- 
sion, a  passion  so  entirely  of  the  spirit  as  to  be  com- 
patible with  permanent  bodily  absence  from  its  object. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  235 

Stephen's  body  had  lived  at  ease  in  England  (a  country 
that  he  declared  his  spirit  hated)  ever  since  he  had  been 
old  enough  to  choose  a  habitation  for  himself. 

He  justified  his  predilection  on  three  grounds:  Ire- 
land had  been  taken  from  him;  Ireland  had  been  so 
ruined  and  raped  by  the  Scotch  and  the  English  that 
nothing  but  the  soul  of  Ireland  was  left  for  Irishmen  to 
love.  He  could  work  and  fight  for  Ireland  better  in 
London  than  in  Dublin.  And  again,  the  Irishman  in  Eng- 
land can  make  havoc  in  his  turn;  he  can  harry  the  Eng- 
lish, he  can  spite,  and  irritate  and  triumph  and  get 
his  own  back  in  a  thousand  ways.  Living  in  England 
he  would  be  a  thorn  in  England's  side. 

And  all  this  meant  that  there  was  no  place  in  Ireland 
for  a  man  of  his  talents  and  his  temperament.  His 
enemies  called  him  an  opportunist:  but  he  was  a  op- 
portunist gone  wrong,  abandoned  to  an  obstinate  ideal- 
ism, one  of  those  damned  and  solitary  souls  that  only 
the  north  of  Ireland  produces  in  perfection.  For  the 
Protestantism  of  Ulster  breeds  rebels  like  no  other  rebels 
on  earth,  rebels  as  strong  and  obstinate  and  canny  as 
itself.  Before  he  was  twenty-one  Stephen  had  revolted 
against  the  material  comfort  and  the  spiritual  tyranny 
of  his  father's  house. 

He  was  the  great-grandson  of  an  immigrant  Lancashire 
cotton  spinner  settled  in  Belfast.  His  western  Irish 
blood  was  steeled  with  this  mixture,  and  braced  and  em- 
bittered with  the  Scottish  blood  of  Antrim  where  his  peo- 
ple married. 

Therefore,  if  he  had  chosen  one  career  and  stuck  to  it 
he  would  have  been  formidable.     But  one  career  alone 


236  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

did  not  suffice  for  his  inexhaustible  energies.  As  a  fisher 
of  opportunities  he  drew  with  too  wide  a  net  and  in  too 
many  waters.  He  had  tried  parliamentary  politics  and 
failed  because  no  party  trusted  him,  least  of  all  his  own. 
And  yet  few  men  were  more  trustworthy.  He  turned  his 
back  on  the  House  of  Commons  and  took  to  journalism. 
As  a  journalistic  politician  he  ran  Nationalism  for  Ireland 
and  Socialism  for  England.  Neither  Nationalists  nor 
Socialists  believed  in  him ;  yet  few  men  were  more  worthy 
of  belief.  In  literature  he  had  distinguished  himself  as 
a  poet,  a  playwright,  a  novelist  and  an  essayist.  He  did 
everything  so  well  that  he  was  supposed  not  to  do  any- 
thing quite  well  enough.  Because  of  his  politics  other 
men  of  letters  suspected  his  artistic  sincerity;  yet  few 
artists  were  more  sincere.  His  very  distinction  was  un- 
satisfying. Without  any  of  the  qualities  that  make 
even  a  minor  statesman,  he  was  so  far  contaminated  by 
politics  as  to  be  spoiled  for  the  highest  purposes  of  art ;  yet 
there  was  no  sense  in  which  he  had  achieved  popular- 
ity. 

Everywhere  he  went  he  was  an  alien  and  suspected.  Do 
what  he  would,  he  fell  between  two  countries  and  two 
courses.  Ireland  had  cast  him  out  and  England  would 
none  of  him.  He  hated  Catholicism  and  Protestantism 
alike,  and  Protestants  and  Catholics  alike  disowned  him. 
To  every  Church  and  every  sect  he  was  a  free  thinker,  des- 
titute of  all  religion.  Yet  few  men  were  more  religious. 
His  enemies  called  him  a  turner  and  a  twister;  yet  on 
any  one  of  his  lines  no  man  ever  steered  a  straighter 
course. 

A  capacity  for  turning  and  twisting  might  have  saved 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  237 

him.  It  would  at  any  rate  have  made  him  more  in- 
telligible. As  it  was,  he  presented  to  two  countries  the 
disconcerting  spectacle  of  a  many-sided  object  moving 
with  violence  in  a  dead  straight  line.  He  moved  so  fast 
that  to  a  stationary  on-looker  he  was  gone  before  one 
angle  of  him  had  been  apprehended.  It  was  for  other 
people  to  turn  and  twist  if  any  one  of  them  was  to  get 
a  complete  all-round  view  of  the  amazing  man. 

But  taken  all  round  he  passed  for  a  man  of  hard  wit  and 
suspicious  brilliance. 

And  he  belonged  to  no  generation.  In  nineteen-thir- 
teen  he  was  not  yet  forty,  too  old  to  count  among  the 
young  men,  and  yet  too  young  for  men  of  his  own  age. 
So  that  in  all  Ireland  and  all  England  you  could  not 
have  found  a  lonelier  man. 

The  same  queer  doom  pursued  him  in  the  most  private 
and  sacred  relations  of  his  life.  To  all  intents  and  pur- 
poses he  was  married  to  Vera  Harrison  and  yet  he  was 
not  married.     He  was  neither  bound  nor  free. 

All  this  had  made  him  sorrowful  and  bitter. 

And  to  add  to  his  sorrowfulness  and  bitterness  he  had 
something  of  the  Celt's  spiritual  abhorrence  of  the  flesh ; 
and  though  he  loved  Vera,  after  his  manner,  there  were 
moments  when  Vera's  capacity  for  everlasting  passion  left 
him  tired  and  bored  and  cold. 

All  his  life  his  passions  had  been  at  the  service  of  ideas. 
All  his  life  he  had  looked  for  some  great  experience,  some 
great  satisfaction  and  consummation;  and  he  had  not 
found  it. 

In  nineteen-thirteen,  with  half  his  life  behind  him,  the 
opportunist  was  still  waiting  for  his  supreme  opportunity. 


238  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Meanwhile  his  enemies  said  of  him  that  he  snatched. 

But  he  did  not  snatch.  The  eyes  of  his  idealism  were 
fixed  too  steadily  on  a  visionary  future.  He  merely  tried, 
with  a  bored  and  weary  gesture,  to  waylay  the  passing 
moment  while  he  waited.  He  had  put  his  political  fail- 
ure behind  him  and  said,  "  I  will  be  judged  as  an  artist 
or  not  at  all."  They  judged  him  accordingly  and  their 
judgment  was  wrong. 

There  was  not  the  least  resemblance  between  Lawrence 
Stephen  as  he  was  in  himself  and  Lawrence  Stephen  as 
he  appeared  to  the  generation  just  behind  him.  To  con- 
servatives he  passed  for  the  leader  of  the  revolution  in 
contemporary  art,  and  yet  the  revolution  in  contemporary 
art  was  happening  without  him.  He  was  not  the  primal 
energy  in  the  movement  of  the  Vortex.  In  nineteen-thir- 
teen  his  primal  energies  were  spent,  and  he  was  trusting  to 
the  movement  of  the  Vortex  to  carry  him  a  little  farther 
than  he  could  have  gone  by  his  own  impetus.  He  was 
attracted  to  the  young  men  of  the  Vortex  because  they 
were  not  of  the  generation  that  had  rejected  him,  and  be- 
cause he  hoped  thus  to  prolong  indefinitely  his  own  youth. 
They  were  attracted  to  him  because  of  his  solitary  distinc- 
tion, his  comparative  poverty,  and  his  unpopularity.  A 
prosperous,  well-established  Stephen  would  have  revolted 
them.  He  gave  the  revolutionaries  the  shelter  of  his  Re- 
view, the  support  of  his  name,  and  the  benefit  of  his  bored 
and  wearied  criticism.  They  brought  him  in  return  a 
certain  homage  founded  on  his  admirable  appreciation  of 
their  merits  and  tempered  by  their  sense  of  his  dealings 
with  the  past  they  abominated. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  239 

"  Stephen  is  a  bigot,"  said  young  Morton  Ellis ;  "  he 
believes  in  Swinburne." 

Stephen  smiled  at  him  in  bored  and  weary  tolerance. 

He  believed  in  too  many  things  for  his  peace  of  mind. 
He  kuew  that  the  young  men  distrusted  him  because  of 
his  beliefs,  and  because  of  his  dealings  with  the  past; 
because  he  refused  to  destroy  the  old  gods  when  he  made 
place  for  the  new. 


Young  Morton  Ellis  lay  stretched  out  at  his  ease  on  the 
couch  in  Stephen's  study. 

He  blinked  and  twitched  as  he  looked  up  at  his  host 
with  half  irritated,  half  affable  affection. 

The  young  men  came  and  went  at  their  ease  in  and  out 
of  that  house  in  St.  John's  Wood  which  Lawrence  Stephen 
shared  with  Vera  Harrison.  They  were  at  home  there. 
Their  books  stood  in  his  bookcase;  they  laid  their  manu- 
scripts on  his  writing  table  and  left  them  there;  they 
claimed  his  empty  spaces  for  the  hanging  of  their  pictures 
yet  unsold. 

Every  Friday  evening  they  met  together  in  the  long, 
low  room  at  the  top  of  the  house,  and  they  talked. 

Every  Friday  evening  Michael  left  his  father's  house 
to  meet  them  there,  and  to  listen  and  to  talk. 

To-night,  round  and  about  Morton  Ellis,  the  young  poet, 
were  Austen  Mitchell,  the  young  painter,  and  Paul 
Monier-Owen,  the  young  sculptor,  and  George  Wadham, 
the  last  and  youngest  of  Morton  Ellis's  disciples. 

Lawrence  Stephen  stood  among  them  like  an  austere 


240  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

guest  in  some  rendezvous  of  violent  youth,  or  like  the 
priest  of  some  romantic  religion  that  he  has  blasphemed 
yet  not  quite  abjured.  He  was  lean  and  dark  and  shaven ; 
his  black  hair  hung  forward  in  two  masses,  smooth  and 
straight  and  square;  he  had  sorrowful,  bitter  eyes,  and  a 
bitter,  sorrowful  mouth,  the  long  Irish  upper  lip  fine  and 
hard  drawn,  while  the  lower  lip  quivered  incongruously, 
pouted  and  protested  and  recanted,  was  sceptical  and  sen- 
sitive and  tender.  His  short,  high  nose  had  wide  yet  fas- 
tidious nostrils. 

It  was  at  this  figure  that  Morton  Ellis  continued  to  gaze 
with  affability  and  irritation.  It  was  this  figure  that 
Vera's  eyes  followed  with  anxious,  restless  passion,  as  if 
she  felt  that  at  any  moment  he  might  escape  her,  might 
be  off,  God  knew  where. 

Lawrence  Stephen  was  ill  at  ease  in  that  house  and  in 
the  presence  of  his  mistress  and  his  friends. 

"  I  believe  in  the  past,"  he  said,  "  because  I  believe 
in  the  future.  I  want  continuity.  Therefore  I  believe 
in  Swinburne;  and  I  believe  in  Browning  and  in  Tenny- 
son and  Wordsworth ;  I  believe  in  Keats  and  Shelley  and 
in  Milton.  But  I  do  not  believe,  any  more  than  you  do, 
in  their  imitators.  I  believe  in  destroying  their  imi- 
tators.    I  do  not  believe  in  destroying  them." 

"  You  can't  destroy  their  imitators  unless  you  destroy 
them.  They  breed  the  disgusting  parasites.  Their  mem- 
ories harbour  them  like  a  stinking  suit  of  old  clothes. 
They  must  be  scrapped  and  burned  if  we're  to  get  rid  of 
the  stink.  Art  has  got  to  be  made  young  and  new  and 
clean.  There  isn't  any  disinfectant  that'll  do  the  trick. 
So  long  as  old  masters  are  kow-towed  to  as  masters  people 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  241 

will  go  on  imitating  them.  When  a  poet  ceases  to  be  a 
poet  and  becomes  a  centre  of  corruption,  he  must  go." 

Michael  said,  "  How  about  us  when  people  imitate  us  ? 
Have  we  got  to  go  ? " 

Morton  Ellis  looked  at  him  and  blinked.  "No,"  he 
said.     "  No.     We  haven't  got  to  go." 

"  I  don't  see  how  you  get  out  of  it." 

"  I  get  out  of  it  by  doing  things  that  can't  be  imi- 
tated." 

There  was  a  silence  in  which  everybody  thought  of  Mr. 
George  Wadham.  It  made  Mr.  Wadham  so  uncomfortable 
that  he  had  to  break  it. 

"  I  say,  how  about  Shakespeare  ?  "  he  said. 

"  Nobody,  so  far,  has  imitated  Shakespeare,  any  more 
than  they  have  succeeded  in  imitating  me." 

There  was  another  silence  while  everybody  thought  of 
Morton  Ellis  as  the  imitator  of  every  poetic  form  under 
the  sun  except  the  forms  adopted  by  his  contemporaries. 

"  That's  all  very  well,  Ellis,"  said  Stephen,  "  but  you 
aren't  the  Holy  Ghost  coming  down  out  of  heaven.  We 
can  trace  your  sources." 

"  My  dear  Stephen,  I  never  said  I  was  the  Holy  Ghost. 
Nobody  ever  does  come  down  out  of  heaven.  You  can 
trace  my  sources,  thank  God,  because  they're  clean.     I 

haven't  gone  into  every  stream  that  swine  like  and 

and and and "  (he  named  five  con- 
temporary distinctions)  "  have  made  filthy  with  their 
paddling." 

He  went  on.  "  The  very  damnable  question  that  you've 
raised,  Harrison,  is  absurd.  You  believe  in  the  revolu- 
tion.    Well  then,   supposing  the   revolution's   coming  — 


242  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

you  needn't  suppose  it,  because  it's  come.  We  are  the 
revolution  —  the  revolution  means  that  we've  made  a 
clean  sweep  of  the  past.  In  the  future  no  artist  will 
want  to  imitate  anybody.  !No  artist  will  be  allowed  to 
exist  unless  he's  prepared  to  be  buried  alive  or  burned 
alive  rather  than  corrupt  the  younger  generation  with 
the  processes  and  the  products  of  his  own  beastly  dissolu- 
tion. 

"  That's  why  violence  is  right. 

"  '  O  Violenza,  sorgi,  balena  in  questo  cielo 
Sanguigno,  stupra  le  albe, 
irrompi  come  incendio  nei  vesperi, 
fa  di  tutto  il  sereno  una  tempesta, 
fa  di  tutta  la  vita  una  bataglia, 
fa  con  tutte  le  anime  un  odio  solo!  ' 

"  There's  no  special  holiness  in  violence.  Violence  is 
right  because  it's  necessary." 

"  You  mean  it's  necessary  because  it's  right." 

Austen  Mitchell  spoke.  He  was  a  sallow  youth  with 
a  broad,  flat-featured,  British  face,  but  he  had  achieved 
an  appearance  of  great  strangeness  and  distinction  by 
letting  his  hay-coloured  hair  grow  long  and  cultivating  two 
beards  instead  of  one. 

"  Violence,"  he  continued,  "  is  not  a  means ;  it's  an 
end !  Energy  must  be  got  for  its  own  sake,  if  you 
want  to  generate  more  energy  instead  of  standing  still. 
The  difference  between  Pastism  and  Futurism  is  the 
difference  between  statics  and  dynamics.  Futurist  art 
is  simply  art  that  has  gone  on,  that  has  left  off  being 
static    and    become    dynamic.     It    expresses    movement. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  243 

Owen  will  tell  you  better  than  I  can  why  it  expresses 
movement." 

A  light  darted  from  the  corner  of  the  room  where  Paul 
Monier-Owen  had  curled  himself  up.  His  eyes  flashed 
like  the  eyes  of  a  young  wild  animal  roused  in  its  lair. 

Paul  Monier-Owen  was  dark  and  soft  and  supple.  At 
a  little  distance  he  had  the  clumsy  grace  and  velvet  in- 
nocence of  a  black  panther,  half  cub,  half  grown.  The 
tips  of  his  ears,  the  corners  of  his  prominent  eyes,  his  eye- 
brows and  his  long  nostrils  tilted  slightly  upwards  and 
backwards.  Under  his  slender,  mournful  nose  his  restless 
smile  showed  the  white  teeth  of  a  young  animal. 

Above  this  primitive,  savage  base  of  features  that  re- 
sponded incessantly  to  any  childish  provocation,  the  in- 
telligence of  Monier-Owen  watched  in  his  calm  and  beau- 
tiful forehead  and  in  his  eyes. 

He  said,  "  It  expresses  movement,  because  it  presents 
objects  directly  as  cutting  across  many  planes.  To  do 
this  you  have  to  break  up  objects  into  the  lines  and  masses 
that  compose  them,  and  project  those  lines  and  masses 
into  space  on  any  curve,  at  any  angle,  according  to  the 
planes  you  mean  them  to  cross,  otherwise  the  movements 
you  mean  them  to  express.  The  more  planes  intersected 
the  more  movement  you  get.  By  decomposing  figures  you 
compose  movements.  By  decomposing  groups  of  figures 
you  compose  groups  of  movement.  Nothing  but  a  cinema 
can  represent  objects  as  intact  and  as  at  the  same  time 
moving ;  and  even  the  cinema  only  does  this  by  a  series  of 
decompositions  so  minute  as  to  escape  the  eye. 

'  You  want  to  draw  a   battle-piece   or  the  traffic  at 


244  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Hyde  Park  Corner.  It  can't  be  done  unless  you  break 
up  your  objects  as  Mitchell  breaks  them  up.  You  want 
to  carve  figures  in  the  round,  wrestling  or  dancing.  It 
can't  be  done  unless  you  dislocate  their  lines  and  masses 
as  I  dislocate  them,  so  as  to  throw  them  all  at  once  into 
those  planes  that  the  intact  body  could  only  have  traversed 
one  after  another  in  a  given  time. 

"  By  taking  time  into  account  as  well  as  space  we  pro- 
duce rhythm. 

"  I  know  what  you're  going  to  say,  Stephen.  The 
Dancing  Faun  and  the  Frieze  of  the  Parthenon  express 
movements.  But  they  do  nothing  of  the  sort.  They  ex- 
press movements  arrested  at  a  certain  point.  They  are 
supposed  to  represent  nature,  but  they  do  not  even  do 
that,  because  arrested  motion  is  a  contradiction  in  terms, 
and  because  the  point  of  arrest  is  an  artificial  and  arbi- 
trary thing. 

"  Your  medium  limits  you.  You  have  to  choose  be- 
tween the  intact  body  which  is  stationary  and  the  broken 
and  projected  bodies  which  are  in  movement.  That  is 
why  we  destroy  or  suppress  symmetry  in  the  figure  and 
in  design.  Because  symmetry  is  perfect  balance  which  is 
immobility.  If  I  wanted  to  present  perfect  rest  I  should 
do  it  by  an  absolute  symmetry." 

"  And  there's  more  in  it  than  that,"  said  Austen 
Mitchell.  "  We're  out  against  the  damnable  affectations 
of  naturalism  and  humanism.  If  I  draw  a  perfect  like- 
ness of  a  fat,  pink  woman  I've  got  a  fat,  pink  woman  and 
nothing  else  but  a  fat  pink  woman.  And  a  fat,  pink 
woman  is  a  work  of  Nature,  not  a  work  of  art.  And  I'm 
lying.     I'm  presenting  as  a  reality  what  is  only  an  ap- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  245 

pearance.  The  better  the  likeness  the  bigger  the  lie.  But 
movement  and  rhythm  are  realities,  not  appearances. 
When  I  present  rhythm  and  movement  I've  done  some- 
thing.    I've  made  reality  appear." 

He  went  on  to  unfold  a  scheme  for  restoring  vigour 
to  the  exhausted  language  by  destroying  its  articulations. 
These  he  declared  to  be  purely  arbitrary,  therefore  fatal 
to  the  development  of  a  spontaneous  and  individual  style. 
By  breaking  up  the  rigid  ties  of  syntax,  you  do  more  than 
create  new  forms  of  prose  moving  in  perfect  freedom,  you 
deliver  the  creative  spirit  itself  from  the  abominable  con- 
tact with  dead  ideas.  Association,  fixed  and  eternalized 
by  the  structure  of  the  language,  is  the  tyranny  that  keeps 
down  the  live  idea. 

"  We've  got  to  restore  the  innocence  of  memory,  as 
Gauguin  restored  the  innocence  of  the  eye." 


Michael  noticed  that  the  talk  was  not  always  sustained 
at  this  constructive  level.  And  to-night,  towards  twelve 
o'clock,  it  dropped  and  broke  in  a  welter  of  vituperation. 
It  was,  first,  a  frenzied  assault  on  the  Old  Masters,  a 
storming  of  immortal  strongholds,  a  tearing  and  scatter- 
ing of  the  wing  feathers  of  archangels;  then,  from  this 
high  adventure  it  sank  to  a  perfunctory  skirmishing  among 
living  eminences  over  forty,  judged,  by  reason  of  their 
age,  to  be  too  contemptible  for  an  attack  in  force.  It  ral- 
lied again  to  a  bombing  and  blasting  of  minute  inepti- 
tudes, the  slaughter  of  "  swine  like  and  and 

and and "  ;  and  ended  in  a  furious  pursuit 

of  a  volatile  young  poet,  Edward  Rivers,  who  had  escaped 


246  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

by  sheer  levity  from  the  tug  of  the  Vortex,  and  was  set- 
ting up  a  small  swirl  of  his  own. 

Michael  was  with  the  revolutionaries  heart  and  soul ;  he 
believed  in  Morton  Ellis  and  Austen  Mitchell  and  Monier- 
Owen  even  more  than  he  believed  in  Lawrence  Stephen, 
and  almost  as  much  as  he  believed  in  Jules  Reveillaud. 
They  stood  for  all  the  realities  and  all  the  ideas  and  all 
the  accomplishments  to  which  he  himself  was  devoted.  He 
had  no  sort  of  qualms  about  the  wholesale  slaughter  of  the 
inefficient. 

But  to-night,  as  he  listened  to  these  voices,  he  felt  again 
his  old  horror  of  the  collective  soul.  The  voices  spoke 
with  a  terrible  unanimity.  The  vortex — the  Vortex  — 
was  like  the  little  vortex  of  school.  The  young  men,  Ellis 
and  Mitchell  and  Monier-Owen  belonged  to  a  herd  like  the 
school-herd,  hunting  together,  crying  together,  saying  the 
same  thing.  Their  very  revolt  against  the  Old  Masters 
was  a  collective  and  not  an  individual  revolt.  Their  chase 
was  hottest  when  their  quarry  was  one  of  the  pack  who 
had  broken  through  and  got  away.  They  hated  the  fugi- 
tive, solitary  private  soul. 

And  yet  it  was  only  as  private  souls  that  Ellis  and 
Mitchell  and  Monier-Owen  counted.  Each  by  himself  did 
good  things;  each,  if  he  had  the  courage  to  break  loose 
and  go  by  himself,  might  do  a  great  thing  some  day.  Even 
George  Wadham  might  do  something  if  he  could  get 
away  from  Ellis  and  the  rest.  Edward  Rivers  had  had 
courage. 

Michael  thought :  "  It's  Rivers  now.  It'll  be  my  turn 
next."  But  he  had  a  great  longing  to  break  loose  and 
get  away. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  247 

He  thought :  "  I  don't  know  where  they're  all  going 
to  end.  They  think  they're  beginning  something  tremen- 
dous; but  I  can't  see  what's  to  come  of  it.  And  I  don't 
see  how  they  can  go  on  like  that  for  ever.  I  can't  see 
what's  coming.  Yet  something  must  come.  They  can't 
be  the  end." 

He  thought :  "  Their  movement  is  only  a  small  swirl 
in  an  immense  Vortex.  It  may  suck  them  all  down.  But 
it  will  clear  the  air.  They  will  have  helped  to  clear 
it." 

He  thought  of  himself  going  on,  free  from  the  whirl 
of  the  Vortex,  and  of  his  work  as  enduring;  standing 
clear  and  hard  in  the  clean  air. 


END  OF  PAET  II 


PART  III 
VICTORY 


XVIII 

It  was  July,  nineteen-fourteen,  a  month  remarkable  in 
the  British  Isles  because  of  the  fine  weather  and  the  dis- 
turbances in  the  political  atmosphere  due  to  the  fine 
weather. 

Every  other  evening  in  that  July  Anthony  Harrison  re- 
minded his  family  that  fine  weather  is  favourable  to  open- 
air  politics,  and  that  the  mere  off-chance  of  sunstroke  is 
enough  to  bring  out  the  striker.  And  when  Michael  asked 
him  contentiously  what  the  weather  had  to  do  with  Home 
Rule,  he  answered  that  it  had  everything  to  do  with  it 
by  increasing  parliamentary  blood-pressure. 

"  Wait,"  he  said,  "  till  we  get  a  good  thunderstorm. 
You'll  see  how  long  the  strike'll  last,  and  what  Sir  Edward 
Carson  has  to  say  to  Mr.  Redmond  then." 

Anthony  kept  his  head.  He  had  seen  strikes  before, 
and  he  knew  that  Home  Rule  had  never  been  a  part  of 
practical  politics  and  never  would  be. 

And  Michael  and  Dorothea  laughed  at  him.  They  had 
their  own  views  about  the  Home  Rule  question  and  the 
Labor  question,  and  they  could  have  told  Anthony  what 
the  answers  were  going  to  be;  only  they  said  it  wasn't 
any  good  talking  to  Father ;  when  he  got  an  idea  into  his 
dear  old  head  it  stuck  there. 

Now,  on  Mother,  if  you  talked  to  her  long  enough,  you 
could  make  some  impression ;  you  could  get  ideas  into 
her  head  and  you  could  get  them  out. 

251 


252  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Frances,  no  longer  preoccupied  with  the  care  of  young 
children,  had  time  for  the  affairs  of  the  nation.  She  was 
a  more  intelligent  woman  than  the  Mrs.  Anthony  Har- 
rison who,  nineteen  years  ago,  informed  herself  of  the 
affairs  of  the  nation  from  a  rapid  skimming  of  the  Times. 
In  the  last  four  years  the  affairs  of  the  nation  had  thrust 
themselves  violently  upon  her  attention.  She  had  even 
realized  the  Woman's  Suffrage  movement  as  a  vivid  and 
vital  affair,  since  Dorothy  had  taken  part  in  the  fighting 
and  had  gone  to  prison. 

Frances,  sitting  out  this  July  under  her  tree  of  Heaven 
with  the  Times,  had  a  sense  of  things  about  to  happen  if 
other  things  didn't  happen  to  prevent  them.  At  any  rate 
she  had  no  longer  any  reason  to  complain  that  nothing 
happened. 

It  was  the  Home  Rule  crisis  now.  The  fact  that  Eng- 
land and  Ireland  were  on  the  edge  of  civil  war  was 
brought  home  to  her,  not  so  much  by  the  head-lines  in  the 
papers  as  by  the  publication  of  her  son  Michael's  insur- 
gent poem,  "  Ireland,"  in  the  Green  Review. 

For  Michael  had  not  grown  out  of  his  queer  idea. 
He  was  hardly  thirteen  when  he  had  said  that  civil  war 
between  England  and  Ireland  would  be  glorious  if  the 
Irish  won,  and  he  was  saying  it  still.  His  poem  was  the 
green  flag  that  he  flew  in  the  face  of  his  family  and  of 
his  country.  Neither  Frances  nor  Anthony  would  have 
been  likely  to  forget  the  imminence  of  civil  war  (only 
that  they  didn't  really  believe  in  it),  when  from  morning 
till  night  Michael  talked  and  wrote  of  nothing  else.  In 
this  Michael  was  not  carried  away  by  collective  feeling; 
his  dream  of  Ireland's  freedom  was  a  secret  and  solitary 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  253 

dream.  Nobody  he  knew  shared  it  but  Lawrence  Stephen. 
The  passion  he  brought  to  it  made  him  hot  and  restless 
and  intense.  Frances  expressed  her  opinion  of  the  Irish 
crisis  when  she  said,  "  I  wish  that  Carson  man  would 
mind  his  own  business.  This  excitement  is  very  bad 
for  Michael." 

And  she  thanked  Heaven  that  Ireland  was  not  Eng- 
land, and  that  none  of  them  lived  there.  If  there  was 
civil  war  in  Ireland  for  a  week  or  two,  Anthony  and  the 
boys  would  be  out  of  it. 

Frances  was  also  alive  to  the  war  between  Capital  and 
Labour.  There  was,  indeed,  something  very  intimate  and 
personal  to  Frances  in  this  particular  affair  of  the  nation ; 
for  Anthony's  business  was  being  disagreeably  affected 
by  the  strike  in  the  building  trade. 

So  much  so  that  Anthony  had  dismissed  his  chauffeur 
and  given  up  his  idea  of  turning  the  stable  loft  into  a 
billiard-room.  He  had  even  thought  of  trying  to  let  the 
shooting-box  and  the  cottage  on  the  Yorkshire  moors 
which  he  had  bought,  unforeseeingly,  in  the  spring 
of  last  year;  but  Michael  and  Nicholas  had  persuaded 
him  that  this  extreme  measure  was  unnecessary. 

And  Frances,  even  with  the  strike  hanging  over  her, 
was  happy.  For  the  children,  at  their  first  sight  of  pos- 
sible adversity,  were  showing  what  was  in  them.  Their 
behaviour  made  her  more  arrogant  than  ever.  Michael 
and  Dorothea  had  given  up  their  allowances  and  declared 
their  complete  ability  to  support  themselves.  (They 
earned  about  fifty  pounds  a  year  each  on  an  average.) 
She  had  expected  this  from  Dorothy,  but  not  from 
Michael.     Nicholas   was   doing  the   chauffeur's  work   in 


254  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

his  absence;  and  John  showed  eagerness  to  offer  up  his 
last  year  at  Oxford ;  he  pressed  it  on  his  father  as  his 
contribution  to  the  family  economies. 

Veronica  brought  her  minute  dividends  (paid  to  her 
every  quarter  through  Ferdinand  Cameron's  solicitors), 
and  laid  them  at  Frances's  and  Anthony's  feet.  ("  As 
if,"  Anthony  said,  "  I  could  have  taken  her  poor  little 
money !  ")  Veronica  thought  she  could  go  out  as  a  music 
teacher. 

There  were  moments  when  Frances  positively  enjoyed 
the  strike.  Her  mind  refused  to  grasp  the  danger  of  the 
situation.  She  suspected  Anthony  of  exaggerating  his 
losses  in  order  to  draw  out  Dorothy  and  Michael  and 
Nicholas  and  John,  and  wallow  in  their  moral  beauty. 
He,  too,  was  arrogant.  He  was  convinced  that,  though 
there  might  be  girls  like  Dorothea,  there  were  no  boys 
like  his  three  sons.  As  for  the  strike  in  the  building 
trade,  strikes,  as  Anthony  insisted,  had  happened  before, 
and  none  of  them  had  threatened  for  very  long  either 
Frances's  peace  of  mind  or  Anthony's  prosperity. 

The  present  strike  was  not  interfering  in  the  least  with 
Mrs.  Anthony  Harrison's  Day,  the  last  of  the  season. 
It  fell  this  year,  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  July. 

Long  afterwards  she  remembered  it  by  what  happened 
at  the  end  of  it. 

Frances's  Day  —  the  fourth  Saturday  in  the  month  — 
was  one  of  those  slight  changes  that  are  profoundly  sig- 
nificant. It  stood  for  regeneration  and  a  change  of  heart. 
It  marked  the  close  of  an  epoch.  Frances's  life  of  ex- 
clusive motherhood  had  ended ;  she  had  become,  or  was  at 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  255 

any  rate  trying  to  become,  a  social  creature.  Her  Day 
had  bored  her  terribly  at  first,  when  it  didn't  frighten 
her;  she  was  only  just  beginning  to  get  used  to  it;  and 
still,  at  times,  she  had  the  air  of  not  taking  it  seriously. 
It  had  been  forced  on  her.  Dorothea  had  decided  that  she 
must  have  a  Bay,  like  other  people. 

She  had  had  it  since  Michael's  first  volume  of  Poems 
had  come  out  in  the  spring  of  the  year  before,  when  the 
young  men  who  met  every  Friday  evening  in  Lawrence 
Stephen's  study  began  to  meet  at  Michael's  father's  house. 

Anthony  liked  to  think  that  his  house  was  the  centre 
of  all  this  palpitating,  radiant  life;  of  young  men  doing 
all  sorts  of  wonderful,  energetic,  important,  interesting 
things.  They  stirred  the  air  about  him  and  kept  it  clean ; 
he  liked  the  sound  of  their  feet  and  of  their  voices,  and 
of  their  laughter.  And  when  the  house  was  quiet  and  An- 
thony had  Frances  to  himself  he  liked  that,  too. 

But  Frances  thought :  "  If  only  they  wouldn't  come 
quite  so  often  —  if  only  I  could  have  my  children  some- 
times to  myself !  " 

It  was  the  last  rebellion  of  her  flesh  that  had  borne  and 
suckled  them. 

There  was  this  to  be  said  for  Frances's  Day  that  it 
attracted  and  diverted,  and  confined  to  one  time  and  one 
place  a  whole  crowd  of  tiresome  people,  who,  without  it, 
have  spread  themselves  over  the  whole  month;  also  that 
it  gave  a  great  deal  of  innocent  happiness  to  the  "  Poor 
dears."  Frances  meant  old  Mrs.  Fleming,  and  Louie 
and  Emmeline  and  Edith  Fleming,  who  figured  as  essen- 
tial parts  of  the  social  event.  She  meant  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Jervis,  who,  in  the  inconceivability  of  their  absence  on 


256  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Frances's  Day,  wondered  more  than  ever  why  their 
daughter  Rosalind  found  them  so  impossible.  She  meant 
Mr.  Vereker  and  Mr.  ISTorris  from  the  office,  and  their 
wives  and  children,  and  Anthony's  secretary,  Miss 
Lathom.  If  Miss  Lathom  were  not  engaged  to  young 
George  Vereker,  she  soon  would  be,  to  judge  by  the  be- 
haviour of  their  indiscreet  and  guileless  faces. 

Frances  also  meant  her  brother-in-law,  Bartholomew, 
home  from  India  for  good,  and  cherishing  a  new  disease, 
more  secret  and  more  dangerous  than  his  cancer;  she 
meant  her  brother  Maurice,  who  was  genuinely  invalided, 
who  had  come  back  from  California  for  the  last  time  and 
would  never  be  sent  out  anywhere  again. 

Dorothea  had  said :  "  Let's  kill  them  all  off  in  one  aw- 
ful day."  Frances  had  said:  "Yes,  but  we  must  do  it 
decently.     We  must  be  kind  to  them,  poor  dears !  " 

Above  all  they  must  be  decent  to  Grannie  and  the 
Aunties,  and  to  Uncle  Morrie  and  Uncle  Bartie.  That 
was  the  only  burden  she  had  laid  on  her  children.  It  was 
a  case  of  noblesse  oblige;  their  youth  constrained  them. 
They  had  received  so  much,  and  they  had  been  let  off 
so  much ;  not  one  of  them  had  inherited  the  taint  that 
made  Maurice  and  Emmeline  Fleming  and  Bartie  Har- 
rison creatures  diseased  and  irresponsible.  They  could 
afford  to  be  pitiful  and  merciful. 

And  now  that  the  children  were  grown  up  Frances 
could  afford  to  be  pitiful  and  merciful  herself.  She 
could  even  afford  to  be  grateful  to  the  poor  dears.  She 
looked  on  Maurice  and  Emmeline  and  Bartie  as  scape- 
goats, bearers  of  the  hereditary  taint,  whose  affliction  left 
her  children  clean.     She  thought  of  them  more  and  more 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  257 

in  this  sacred  and  sacrificial  character.  At  fifty-two 
Frances  could  be  gentle  over  the  things  that  had  worried 
and  irritated  her  at  thirty-three.  Like  Anthony  she  was 
still  young  and  strong  through  the  youth  and  strength  of 
her  children. 

And  the  poor  dears  were  getting  weak  and  old.  Grannie 
was  seventy-nine,  and  Maurice,  the  youngest  of  that  gen- 
eration, was  forty-nine,  and  he  looked  sixty.  Every  year 
Frances  was  more  acutely  aware  of  their  pathos,  their  fu- 
tility, their  mortality.  They  would  be  broken  and  gone 
so  soon  and  so  utterly,  leaving  no  name,  no  sign  or  me- 
morial of  themselves ;  only  living  in  the  memories  of  her 
children  who  would  remain. 

And,  with  an  awful  sense  of  mortality  surrounding 
them,  her  children  had  learned  that  they  must  be  kind 
because  the  old  people  would  be  gone  while  they  endured 
and  remained. 

This  Saturday  being  the  last  of  the  season,  they  had  all 
come;  not  only  the  Flemings,  but  the  Jervises  and  Vere- 
kers  and  Norrises,  and  Uncle  Bartie.  The  fine  weather 
alone  would  have  brought  them. 

Bartie,  more  morose  and  irritable  than  ever,  sat  under 
the  tree  of  Heaven  and  watched  the  triumphal  progress 
of  the  Day.  He  scowled  darkly  and  sourly  at  each 
group  in  turn ;  at  the  young  men  in  white  flannels  playing 
tennis ;  at  Mr.  and  Mr.  Jervis  and  the  Verekers  and  ISTor- 
rises;  at  the  Flemings,  old  Mrs.  Fleming,  and  Louie  and 
Emmeline  and  Edith,  and  the  disgraceful  Maurice,  all 
five  of  them  useless  pensioners  on  his  brother's  bounty; 
Maurice  a  thing  of  battered,  sodden  flesh  hanging  loose 


258  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

on  brittle  bone,  a  rickety  prop  for  the  irreproachable 
summer  suit  bought  with  Anthony's  money.  He  scowled 
at  the  tables  covered  with  fine  white  linen,  and  at  the 
costly  silver  and  old  china,  at  the  sandwiches  and  cakes 
and  ices,  and  the  piled-up  fruits  and  the  claret  cup  and 
champagne  cup  glowing  and  shining  in  the  tall  glass  jugs, 
and  at  the  pretty  maidservants  going  to  and  fro  in  their 
accomplished  service. 

Bartie  wondered  how  on  earth  Anthony  managed  it. 
His  wonder  was  a  savage  joy  to  Bartie. 

Mr.  Jervis,  a  heavy,  pessimistic  man,  wondered  how 
they  managed  it,  and  Mr.  Jervis's  wonder  had  its  own 
voluptuous  quality.  Mr.  Vereker  and  Mr.  Norris,  who 
held  that  a  strike  was  a  downright  serious  matter,  also 
wondered.  But  they  were  sustained  by  their  immense 
belief  in  Mr.  Anthony.  Mr.  Anthony  knew  what  he  was 
doing;  he  always  had  known.  A  strike  might  be  serious 
while  it  lasted,  but  it  didn't  last.  And  Mr.  Nicholas  was 
in  the  business  now,  and  Mr.  John  was  coming  into  it 
next  year,  and  Mr.  Nicholas  might  be  married  again  by 
that  time ;  and  the  chances  were  that  the  firm  of  Harrison 
and  Harrison  would  last  long  enough  to  provide  for  a 
young  Vereker  and  a  still  younger  Norris. 

In  spite  of  the  strike,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Vereker  and  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Norris,  like  Frances  and  Anthony,  were  extraor- 
dinarily cheerful  that  afternoon. 

So  were  young  George  Vereker  and  Miss  Lathom. 

"  I  can't  think  why  I  feel  so  happy,"  said  Mrs.  Vereker 
to  Mrs.  Norris.     She  was  looking  at  her  son  George. 

"  Nor  I,  either,"  said  Miss  Lathom,  who  was  trying 
suddenly  to  look  at  nothing  in  particular. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  259 

Miss  Lathom  lied  and  Mrs.  Vereker  lied ;  they  knew 
perfectly  well  why  they  were  happy.  Each  knew  that  the 
other  lied;  each  knew  that  the  other  knew  she  knew;  and 
neither  of  thern  could  have  said  why  she  found  it  so 
necessary  to  lie. 

And  to  Frances  this  happiness  of  Mrs.  Vereker,  and 
of  young  Vereker  and  Miss  Lathom  was  significant  and 
delightful,  as  if  she  had  been  personally  responsible  for  it. 

A  day  flashed  out  of  her  memory  on  a  trail  of  blue 
larkspurs  and  of  something  that  she  had  forgotten,  some- 
thing that  was  mixed  up  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Jervis  and 
Rosalind.  She  stared  at  the  larkspurs  as  if  they  held  the 
clue  —  Nicky's  face  appeared  among  the  tall  blue  spires, 
Nicky's  darling  face  tied  up  in  a  scarf,  brown  stripes  and 
yellow  stripes  —  something  to  do  with  a  White  Cake  — 
it  must  have  been  somebody's  birthday.  Now  she  had 
it  —  Mr.  Jervis's  cricket  scarf.  It  was  the  day  of  Nicky's 
worst  earache,  the  day  when  Mr.  Vereker  climbed  the 
tree  of  Heaven  —  was  it  possible  that  Mr.  Vereker  had 
ever  climbed  that  tree  ?  —  the  day  when  Michael  wouldn't 
go  to  the  party  —  Rosalind's  birthday. 

Eight  candles  burning  for  Rosalind.  Why,  it  was 
nineteen  years  ago.  Don-Don  was  a  baby  then,  and 
Michael  and  Nicky  were  only  little  boys.  And  look  at 
them  now ! 

She  fed  her  arrogance  by  gazing  on  the  tall,  firmly 
knit,  slender  bodies  of  her  sons,  in  white  flannels,  playing 
furiously  and  well. 

"  Dorothy  is  looking  very  handsome,"  Mrs.  Jervis  said. 

Yes,    certainly    Dorothy   was   looking   handsome;    but 


260  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Francos  loved  before  all  things  the  male  beauty  of  her 
sons.  In  Michael  and  Nicholas  it  had  reached  perfection, 
the  clean,  hard  perfection  that  would  last,  as  Anthony's 
had  lasted. 

She  thought  of  their  beauty  that  had  passed  from  her, 
dying  many  deaths,  each  death  hurting  her;  the  tender 
mortal  beauty  of  babyhood,  of  childhood,  of  boyhood ; 
but  this  invulnerable  beauty  of  their  young  manhood 
would  be  with  her  for  a  long  time.  John  would  have  it. 
John  was  only  a  fairer  Nicholas ;  but  as  yet  his  beauty 
had  not  hardened ;  his  boyhood  lingered  in  the  fine  tissues 
of  his  mouth,  and  in  his  eyelids  and  the  soft  corners  of 
his  eyes;  so  that  in  John  she  could  still  see  what  Nicky 
had  been. 

She  had  adored  Anthony's  body,  as  if  she  had  foreseen 
that  it  would  give  her  such  sons  as  these;  and  in  her 
children  she  had  adored  the  small  bodies  through  whose 
clean,  firm  beauty  she  foresaw  the  beauty  of  their  man- 
hood. These  were  the  same  bodies,  the  same  faces  that 
she  had  loved  in  them  as  children ;  nothing  was  blurred  or 
twisted  or  overlaid. 

Michael  at  six-and-twenty  was  beautiful  and  serious 
as  she  had  foreseen  him.  Frances  knew  that  Michael  had 
genius,  and  at  other  moments  she  was  proud  of  his  genius ; 
but  at  this  particular  moment,  sitting  beside  her  friend 
and  conscious  of  her  jealousy,  she  was  chiefly  aware  of 
his  body. 

Michael's  body  was  quiescent;  its  beauty  gave  her  a 
proud,  but  austere  and  tranquil  satisfaction.  It  was 
when  she  looked  at  her  second  son  that  something  caught 
at  her  breath  and  held  it.     She  saw  him   as  the  lovei' 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  261 

and  bridegroom  of  Veronica.  Her  sense  of  his  virility 
was  terrible  to  her  and  delightful. 

Perhaps  they  were  engaged  already. 

And  Frances  was  sorry  for  Mrs.  Jervis,  who  had  borne 
no  sons,  who  had  only  borne  one  unattractive  and  unsatis- 
factory daughter.  She  used  to  be  sorry  for  her  because 
Rosalind  was  pink  and  fat  and  fluffy ;  she  was  sorry  for  her 
now  because  Eosalind  was  unsatisfactory.  She  was  sorry 
for  Mrs.  Norris  because  her  boy  could  never  grow  up  like 
Michael  or  Nicholas  or  John.  She  was  sorry  for  Mrs. 
Vereker  because  George,  though  he  looked  all  right  when 
he  was  by  himself,  became  clumsy  and  common  at  once 
beside  Michael  and  Nicholas  and  John.  George  was  also 
in  white  flannels ;  he  played  furiously  and  well ;  he  played 
too  furiously  and  too  consciously  well ;  he  was  too  damp 
and  too  excited;  his  hair  became  damp  and  excited  as  he 
played ;  his  cries  had  a  Cockney  tang. 

Her  arrogance  nourished  itself  on  these  contrasts. 

Mrs.  Jervis  looked  wistfully  at  the  young  men  as  they 
played.     She  looked  still  more  wistfully  at  Dorothy. 

"  What  do  you  do,"  she  said,  "  to  keep  your  children 
with  you  ?  " 

"  I  do  nothing,"  Frances  said.  "  I  don't  try  to  keep 
them.  I've  never  appealed  to  their  feelings  for  my  own 
purposes,  or  taken  advantage  of  their  affection,  that's  all. 

"  They  know  that  if  they  want  to  walk  out  of  the  house 
to-morrow,  and  stay  out,  they  can.     Nobody'll  stop  them." 

There  was  a  challenging,  reminiscent  glint  in  Mr.  Jer- 
vis's  eyes,  and  his  wife  was  significantly  silent.  Frances 
knew  what  they  were  thinking. 

"  Nicky,"   she  said,   "  walked  out ;  but  he  came  back 


262  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

again  as  soon  as  he  was  in  trouble.  Michael  walks  out 
and  goes  abroad  every  year;  but  he  comes  back  again. 
Dorothy  walks  out,  but  she's  never  dreamed  of  not  coming 
back  again." 

"  Of  course,  if  you  aren't  afraid  of  taking  risks,"  said 
Mr.  Jervis. 

"  I  am  afraid.     But  I've  never  shown  it." 

"  It's  very  strange  that  Dorothy  hasn't  married." 
Mrs.  Jervis  spoke.  She  derived  comfort  from  the  thought 
that  Dorothy  was  eight-and-twenty  and  not  married. 

"  Dorothy,"  said  Frances,  "  could  marry  to-morrow  if 
she  wanted  to ;  but  she  doesn't  want." 

She  was  sorry  for  her  friend,  but  she  really  could  not 
allow  her  that  consolation. 

"  Veronica  is  growing  up  very  good-looking,"  said  Mrs. 
Jervis  then. 

But  it  was  no  use.  Frances  was  aware  that  Veronica 
was  grown  up,  and  that  she  was  good-looking,  and  that 
Nicky  loved  her;  but  Mrs.  Jervis's  shafts  fell  wide  of  all 
her  vulnerable  places.     Frances  was  no  longer  afraid. 

"  Veronica,"  she  said,  "  is  growing  up  very  good." 

It  was  not  the  word  she  would  have  chosen,  yet  it  was 
the  only  one  she  could  think  of  as  likely  to  convey  to  Mrs. 
Jervis  what  she  wanted  her  to  know,  though  it  left  her 
obtuseness  without  any  sense  of  Veronica's  mysterious 
quality. 

She  herself  had  never  tried  to  think  of  a  word  for  it 
before ;  she  was  only  driven  to  it  now  because  she  detected 
in  her  friend's  tone  a  challenge  and  a  warning.  It  was  as 
if  Itosalind's  mother  had  said,  extensively  and  with 
pointed  reference  to  the  facts:     "Veronica  is  dangerous. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  263 

Her  mother  has  had  adventures.  She  is  grown-up  and 
she  is  good-looking,  and  Nicky  is  susceptible  to  that  sort 
of  thing.  If  you  don't  look  out  he  will  be  caught  again. 
The  only  difference  between  Phyllis  Desmond  and  Vero- 
nica is  in  their  skins." 

So  when  Frances  said  Veronica  was  good,  she  meant 
that  Mrs.  Jervis  should  understand,  once  for  all,  that  she 
was  not  in  the  least  like  her  mother  or  like  Phyllis  Des- 
mond. 

That  was  enough  for  Mrs.  Jervis.  But  it  was  not 
enough  for  Frances,  who  found  her  mind  wandering  off 
from  Rosalind's  mother  and  looking  for  the  word  of  words 
that  would  express  her  own  meaning  to  her  own  satisfac- 
tion. 

Her  thoughts  went  on  deep  down  under  the  stream 
of  conversation  that  flowed  through  her  from  Mrs.  Jervis 
on  her  right  hand  to  Mrs.  Vereker  and  Mrs.  Norris  on 
her  left. 

Veronica  was  good.  But  she  was  not  wrapped  up  in 
other  people's  lives  as  Trances  was  wrapped  up.  She 
was  wrapped  up,  not  in  herself,  but  in  some  life  of  her 
own  that,  as  Frances  made  it  out,  had  nothing  in  the 
world  to  do  with  anybody  else's. 

And  yet  Veronica  knew  what  you  were  feeling  and  what 
you  were  thinking,  and  what  you  were  going  to  do,  and 
what  was  happening  to  you.  (She  had  really  known,  in 
Dresden,  what  was  happening  to  Nicky  when  Desmond 
made  her  marry  him.)  It  was  as  if  in  her  the  walls  that 
divide  every  soul  from  every  other  soul  were  made  of  some 
thin  and  porous  stuff  that  let  things  through.  And  in  thia 
life  of  yours,  for  the  moments  that  she  shared  it,  she  lived 


264  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

intensely,  with  uncanny  delight  and  pain  that  were  her 
own  and  not  her  own. 

And  Frances  wanted  some  hard,  tight  theory  that  would 
reconcile  these  extremes  of  penetration  and  detachment. 

She  remembered  that  Ferdinand  Cameron  had  been 
like  that.  He  saw  things.  He  was  a  creature  of  queer, 
sudden  sympathies  and  insights.  She  supposed  it  was 
the  Highland  blood  in  both  of  them. 

Mrs.  Vereker  on  her  right  expressed  the  hope  that  Mr. 
Bartholomew  was  better.  Frances  said  he  never  would 
be  better  till  chemists  were  forbidden  to  advertise  and  the 
British  Medical  Journal  and  The  Lancet  were  suppressed. 
Bartie  would  read  them ;  and  they  supplied  him  with  all 
sorts  of  extraordinary  diseases. 

She  thought :  Seeing  things  had  not  made  poor  Ferdie 
happy;  and  Veronica  in  her  innermost  life  was  happy. 
She  had  been  happy  when  she  came  back  from  Germany, 
before  she  could  have  known  that  Nicky  cared  for  her, 
before  Nicky  knew  it  himself. 

Supposing  she  had  known  it  all  the  time?  But  that, 
Frances  said  to  herself,  was  nonsense.  If  she  had  known 
as  much  as  all  that,  why  should  she  have  suffered  so  hor- 
ribly that  she  had  nearly  died  of  it  ?  Unless  —  sup- 
posing —  it  had  been  Ms  suffering  that  she  had  nearly 
died  of? 

Mrs.  Norris  on  her  left  was  saying  that  she  was  sorry 
to  see  Mr.  Maurice  looking  so  sadly;  and  Frances  heard 
herself  replying  that  Morrie  hadn't  been  fit  for  anything 
since  he  was  in  South  Africa. 

Between  two  pop-gun  batteries  of  conversation  the  se- 
rious theme  sustained  itself.     She  thought :     Then,  Nicky 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  265 

had  suffered.  And  Veronica  was  the  only  one  who  knew. 
She  knew  more  about  Nicky  than  Nicky's  mother.  This 
thought  was  disagreeable  to  Frances. 

It  was  all  nonsense.  She  didn't  really  believe  that 
these  things  happened.  Yet,  why  not?  Michael  said 
they  happened.  Even  Dorothy,  who  didn't  believe  in 
God  and  immortality  or  anything,  believed  that. 

She  gave  it  up;  it  was  beyond  her;  it  bothered  her. 

"  Yes.     Seventy-nine  her  last  birthday." 

Mrs.  Norris  had  said  that  Mrs.  Fleming  was  wonderful. 

Frances  thought :  "  It's  wonderful  what  Veronica  does 
to  them." 

The  sets  had  changed.  Nicholas  and  a  girl  friend  of 
Veronica's  played  against  George  Vereker  and  Miss 
Lathom;  John,  with  Mr.  Jervis  for  his  handicap,  played 
against  Anthony  and  Mr.  Norris.  The  very  young  Nor- 
ris fielded.  All  afternoon  he  had  hoped  to  distinguish 
himself  by  catching  some  ball  in  full  flight  as  it  went 
"  out."  It  was  a  pure  and  high  ambition,  for  he  knew 
he  was  so  young  and  unimportant  that  only  the  eyes  of 
God  and  of  his  mother  watched  him. 

Michael  had  dropped  out  of  it.  He  sat  beside  Dorothy 
under  the  tree  of  Heaven  and  watched  Veronica. 

"  Veronica's  wonderful,"  he  said.  "  Did  you  see 
that?" 

Dorothy  had  seen. 

Veronica  had  kept  Aunt  Emmeline  quiet  all  afternoon. 
She  had  made  Bartie  eat  an  ice  under  the  impression  that 
it  would  be  good  for  him.  And  now  she  had  gone  with 
Morrie  to  the  table  where  the  drinks  were,  and  had  taken 


266  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

his  third  glass  of  champagne  cup  from  him  and  made 
him  drink  lemonade  instead. 

"  How  does  she  do  it  ?  "  said  Michael. 

"  I  don't  know.  She  doesn't  know  herself.  I  used  to 
think  I  could  manage  people,  hut  I'm  not  in  it  with 
Ronny.     She  ought  to  he  a  wardress  in  a  lunatic  asylum." 

"  Now  look  at  that !  " 

Veronica  had  returned  to  the  group  formed  by  Grannie 
and  the  Aunties  and  some  strangers.  The  eyes  of  the 
four  Fleming  women  had  looked  after  her  as  she  went 
from  them;  they  looked  towards  her  now  as  if  some  great 
need,  some  great  longing  were  appeased  by  her  return. 

Grannie  made  a  place  by  her  side  for  the  young  girl; 
she  took  her  arm,  the  young  white  arm,  bare  from  the 
elbow  in  its  short  sleeve,  and  made  it  lie  across  her  knees. 
Prom  time  to  time  Grannie's  yellow,  withered  hand 
stroked  the  smooth,  wTarm  white  arm,  or  held  it.  Emme- 
line  and  Edith  squatted  on  the  grass  at  Veronica's  feet; 
their  worn  faces  and  the  worn  face  of  Louie  looked  at  her. 
They  hung  on  her,  fascinated,  curiously  tranquillized, 
as  if  they  drank  from  her  youth. 

"  It's  funny,"  Dorothy  said,  "  when  you  think  how 
they  used  to  hate  her." 

"  It's  horrible,"  said  Michael. 

He  got  up  and  took  Veronica  away. 

ne  was  lying  at  her  feet  now  on  the  grass  in  the  far 
corner  of  the  lawn  under  the  terrace. 

"  Why  do  yon  go  to  them  ?  "  he  said. 

"  Because  they  want  me." 

"  You  mustn't  go  when  they  want  you.  You  mustn't 
let  them  get  hold  of  you." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  267 

"  They  don't  get  hold  of  me  —  nothing  gets  hold  of  me. 
I  want  to  help  them.  They  say  it  does  them  good  to  have 
me  with  them." 

"  I  should  think  it  did  do  them  good !  They  feed  on 
you,  Ronny.  I  can  see  it  by  the  way  they  look  at  you. 
You'll  die  of  them  if  you  don't  give  it  up." 

"  Give  what  up  ?  " 

"Your  game  of  keeping  them  going.  That  is  your  game, 
isn't  it  ?  Everybody's  saying  how  wonderful  Grannie  is. 
They  mean  she  ought  to  have  been  dead  years  ago.    • 

"  They  were  all  old,  horribly  old  and  done  for,  ages  ago. 
I  can  remember  them.  But  they  know  that  if  they  can  get 
a  young  virgin  sacrificed  to  them  they'll  go  on.  you're 
the  young  virgin.      You're  making  them  go  on." 

"  If  I  could  —  it  wouldn't  hurt  me.  Nothing  hurts 
you,  Michael,  when  you're  happy.  It's  awful  to  think 
how  they've  lived  without  being  happy,  without  lov- 
ing. 

"  They  used  to  hate  me  because  I'm  Vera's  daughter. 
They  don't  hate  me  now." 

"  You  don't  hate  what  you  feed  on.  You  love  it. 
They're  vampires.  They'll  suck  your  life  out  of  you.  I 
wonder  you're  not  afraid  of  them. 

"  I'm  afraid  of  them.  I  always  was  afraid  of  them ; 
when  I  was  a  kid  and  Mother  used  to  send  me  with  mes- 
sages to  that  beastly  spooky  house  they  live  in.  I  used  to 
think  it  was  poor  old  Grandpapa's  ghost  I  funked.  But 
I  know  now  it  wasn't.  It  was  those  four  terrible  women. 
Thei/rc  ghosts.     I  thought  you  were  afraid  of  ghosts." 

"  I'm  much  more  afraid  of  yon,  when  you're  cruel. 
Can't  you  see  how  awful  it  must  be  for  them  to  be  ghosts  ? 


268  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Ghosts  among  living  people.     Everybody  afraid  of  them 
—  not  wanting  them. 

"  Michael  —  it  would  be  better  to  be  dead  !  " 

Towards  the  end  of  the  afternoon  Frances's  Day  changed 
its  appearance  and  its  character.  In  the  tennis  courts 
Michael's  friends  played  singles  with  an  incomparable 
fury,  frankly  rejecting  the  partners  offered  them  and 
disdaining  inferior  antagonists ;  they  played,  Ellis  against 
Mitchell  and  Monier-Owen  against  Nicholas. 

They  had  arrived  late  with  Vera  and  Lawrence 
Stephen. 

It  had  come  to  that.  Anthony  and  Frances  found  that 
they  could  not  go  on  for  ever  refusing  the  acquaintance 
of  the  man  who  had  done  so  much  for  Michael.  Stephen's 
enthusiastic  eulogy  of  Michael's  Poems  had  made  an  end 
of  that  old  animosity  a  year  ago.  Practically,  they  had 
had  to  choose  between  Bartie  and  Lawrence  Stephen  as 
the  turning  point  of  honour.  Michael  had  made  them  see 
that  it  was  possible  to  overvalue  Bartie;  also  that  it  was 
possible  to  pay  too  high  a  price  for  a  consecrated  moral 
attitude.  In  all  his  life  the  wretched  Bartie  had  never 
done  a  thing  for  any  of  them,  whereas  he,  Michael,  owed 
his  rather  extraordinary  success  absolutely  to  Lawrence 
Stephen.  If  the  strike  made  his  father  bankrupt  he 
would  owe  his  very  means  of  livelihood  to  Lawrence 
Stephen. 

Besides,  he  liked  Stephen,  and  it  complicated  things 
most  frightfully  to  go  on  living  in  the  same  house  with 
people  who  disliked  him. 

If,   Michael  said,   they  chose  to  dissociate  themselves 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  269 

altogether  from  their  eldest  son  and  his  career,  very  well. 
They  could  go  on  ignoring  and  tacitly  insulting  Mr. 
Stephen.  He  could  understand  their  taking  a  consistently 
wrong-headed  line  like  that;  but  so  long  as  they  had  any 
regard,  either  for  him  or  his  career,  he  didn't  see  how  they 
could  very  well  keep  it  up  any  longer.  He  was  sorry, 
of  course,  that  his  career  had  let  them  in  for  Stephen  if 
they  didn't  like  him ;  but  there  it  was. 

And  beyond  a  doubt  it  was  there. 

"  You  might  vindicate  Bartie  gloriously,"  Michael 
said,  "  by  turning  me  out  of  the  house  and  disinheriting 
me.  But  would  it  be  worth  while  ?  I'm  not  asking 
you  to  condone  Stephen's  conduct  —  if  you  can't  condone 
it;  I'm  asking  you  either  to  acknowledge  or  repudiate 
your  son's  debts. 

"  After  all,  if  he  can  condone  your  beastly  treatment 

of  him I  wouldn't  like  him  if  he  was  the  swine  you 

think  him." 

And  Anthony  had  appealed  to  Michael's  mother. 

To  his  "  Well,  Frances,  what  do  you  think  ?  Ought 
we  or  oughtn't  we  ? "  she  had  replied :  "  I  think  we  ought 
to  stand  solid  behind  Michael." 

It  was  Michael's  life  that  counted,  for  it  was  going 
on  into  a  great  future.  Bartie  would  pass  and  Michael 
would  remain. 

Their  nervous  advances  had  ended  in  a  complete  sur- 
render to  Stephen's  charm. 

Vera  and  Stephen  seemed  to  think  that  the  way  to  show 
the  sincerity  and  sweetness  of  their  reconciliation  was  to 
turn  up  as  often  as  possible  on  Frances's  Day.  They  ar- 
rived always  at  the  same  hour,  a  little  late;  they  came  by 


270  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  road  and  the  front  door,  so  that  when  Bartie  saw  them 
coming  he  could  retreat  through  the  garden  door  and  the 
lane.  The  Flemings  and  the  Jervises  retreated  with  him ; 
and  presently,  when  it  had  had  a  good  look  at  the  celeb- 
rities, the  rest  of  the  party  followed. 

This  Saturday  Frances's  Day  dwindled  and  melted  away 
and  closed,  after  its  manner;  only  Vera  and  Stephen 
lingered.  They  stayed  on  talking  to  Michael  long  after 
everybody  else  had  gone. 

Stephen  said  he  had  come  to  say  good-bye  to  Michael's 
people  and  to  make  a  proposal  to  Michael  himself.  He 
was  going  to  Ireland. 

Vera  interrupted  him  with  passion. 

"  He  isn't.  He  hasn't  any  proposal  to  make.  He 
hasn't  come  to  say  good-bye." 

Her  restless,  unhappy  eyes  turned  to  him  incessantly, 
as  if,  more  than  ever,  she  was  afraid  that  he  would  escape 
her,  that  he  would  go  off  God  knew  where. 

God  knew  where  he  was  going,  but  Vera  did  not  believe 
that  he  was  going  to  Ireland.  He  had  talked  about  going 
to  Ireland  for  years,  and  he  had  never  gone. 

Stephen  looked  as  if  he  did  not  see  her;  as  if  he  did 
not  even  see  Michael  very  distinctly. 

"  I'm  going,"  he  said,  "  to  Ireland  on  Monday  week, 
the  third  of  August.  I  mayn't  come  back  for  long  enough. 
I  may  not  come  back  at  all." 

"  That's  the  sort  of  thing  he  keeps  on  saying." 

"  I  may  not  come  back  at  all.  So  I  want  you  to  take 
over  the  Review  for  me.  Ellis  and  my  secretary  will 
show  you  how  it  stands.  You'll  know  what  to  do.  I  can 
trust  you  not  to  let  it  down." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  271 

"  He  doesn't  mean  what  he  says,  Michael.  He's  only 
saying  it  to  frighten  me.  He's  been  holding  it  over  me 
for  years. 

"  Say  you'll  have  nothing  to  do  with  it.  Say  you  won't 
touch  his  old  Review." 

"  Could  I  go  to  Ireland  for  you  ?  " 

"  You  couldn't." 

"  Why  not  ?  What  do  you  think  you're  going  to  do 
there  ?  " 

"  I'm  going  to  pull  the  Nationalists  together,  so  that 
if  there's  civil  war  in  Ireland,  the  Irish  will  have  a 
chance  to  win.  Thank  God  for  Carson!  He's  given  us 
the  opportunity  we  wanted." 

"  Tell  him  he's  not  to  go,  Michael.  He  won't  listen  to 
me,  but  he'll  mind  what  you  say." 

"  I  want  to  go  instead  of  him." 

"  You  can't  go  instead  of  me.  Nobody  can  go  instead 
of  me." 

"  I  can  go  with  you." 

"  You  can't." 

"  Larry,  if  you  take  Michael  to  Ireland,  Anthony  and 
Frances  will  never  forgive  you.     I'll  never  forgive  you." 

"  I'm  not  taking  Michael  to  Ireland,  I'm  telling  you. 
There's  no  reason  why  Michael  should  go  to  Ireland  at  all. 
It  isn't  his  country." 

"  You  needn't  rub  that  in,"  said  Michael. 

"  It  isn't  yours"  said  Vera.  "  Ireland  doesn't  want 
you.  The  Nationalists  don't  want  you.  You  said 
yourself  they've  turned  you  out  of  Ireland.  When  you've 
lived  in  England  all  these  years  why  should  you  go  back 
to  a  place  that  doesn't  want  you  ?  " 


272  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Because  if  Carson  gets  a  free  hand  I  see  some  chance 
of  Ireland  being  a  free  country." 

Vera  wailed  and  entreated.  She  said  it  showed  how 
much  he  cared  for  her.  It  showed  that  he  was  tired  of 
her.     Why  couldn't  he  say  so  and  have  done  with  it  ? 

"  It's  not,"  she  said,  "  as  if  you  could  really  do  anything. 
You're  a  dreamer.     Ireland  has  had  enough  of  dreamers." 

And  Stephen's  eyes  looked  over  her  head,  into  the  high 
branches  of  the  tree  of  Heaven,  as  if  he  saw  his  dream 
shining  clear  through  them  like  a  moon. 

The  opportunist  could  see  nothing  but  his  sublime  op- 
portunity. 

Michael  went  back  with  him  to  dine  and  talk  it  over. 

There  was  to  be  civil  war  in  Ireland  then  ? 

He  thought :  If  only  Lawrence  would  let  him  go  with 
him.  He  wanted  to  go  to  Ireland.  To  join  the  Nation- 
alists and  fight  for  Ireland,  fight  for  the  freedom  he  was 
always  dreaming  about  —  that  would  be  a  fine  thing.  It 
would  be  a  finer  thing  than  writing  poems  about  Ireland. 

Lawrence  Stephen  went  soberly  and  steadily  through 
the  affair  of  the  Review,  explaining  things  to  Michael. 
He  wanted  this  done,  and  this.  And  over  and  over  again 
Michael's  voice  broke  through  his  instructions.  Why 
couldn't  he  go  to  Ireland  instead  of  Lawrence?  Or,  if 
Lawrence  wouldn't  let  him  go  instead  of  him,  he  might 
at  least  take  him  with  him.  He  didn't  want  to  stay  at 
home  editing  the  Review.  Ellis  or  Mitchell  or  Monier- 
Owen  would  edit  it  better  than  he  could.  Even  the 
wretched  Wadham  would  edit  it  just  as  well.  He  wanted 
to  go  to  Ireland  and  fight. 

But  Lawrence  wouldn't  let  him  go.     He  wasn't  going 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  273 

to  have  the  boy's  blood  on  his  hands.     His  genius  and  his 
youth  were  too  precious. 

Besides,  Ireland  was  not  his  country. 

It  was  past  ten  o'clock.  Frances  was  alone  in  the 
drawing-room.  She  sat  by  the  open  window  and  waited 
and  watched. 

The  quiet  garden  lay  open  to  her  sight.  Only  the  inner 
end  of  the  farther  terrace,  under  the  orchard  wall,  was 
hidden  by  a  high  screen  of  privet. 

It  seemed  hours  to  Frances  since  she  had  seen  Nicky 
and  Veronica  go  down  the  lawn  on  to  the  terrace. 

And  then  Anthony  had  gone  out  too.  She  was  vexed 
with  Anthony.  She  could  see  him  sitting  under  his  ash- 
tree,  her  tree  of  Heaven;  his  white  shirt-front  gave  out 
an  oblong  gleam  like  phosphorous  in  the  darkness  under 
the  tree.  She  was  watching  to  see  that  he  didn't  get  up 
and  go  on  to  the  terrace. 

Anthony  had  no  business  in  the  garden  at  all.  He  was 
catching  cold  in  it.  He  had  sneezed  twice.  She  wanted 
Nicholas  and  Veronica  to  have  the  garden  to  themselves 
to-night,  and  the  perfect  stillness  of  the  twilight  to  them- 
selves, every  tree  and  every  little  leaf  and  flower  keeping 
quiet  for  them ;  and  there  was  Anthony  sneezing. 

She  was  restless  and  impatient,  as  if  she  carried  the 
burden  of  their  passion  in  her  own  heart. 

Presently  she  could  bear  it  no  longer.  She  got  up 
and  called  to  Anthony  to  come  in.     He  came  obediently. 

"  What  are  you  thinking  of,"  she  said,  "  planting  your- 
self out  there  and  sneezing  ?  I  could  see  your  shirt-front 
a  mile  off.     It's  indecent  of  you." 


274  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Why  indecent  ?  " 

"  Because  Nicky  and  Veronica  are  out  there." 
"  I  don't  see  them." 

"  Do  you  suppose  they  want  you  to  see  them  ?  " 
She  turned  the  electric  light  on  full,  to  make  darkness 
of  their  twilight  out  there. 

Nicky  and  Veronica  talked  together  in  the  twilight,  sit- 
ting on  the  seat  under  the  orchard  well  behind  the  privet 
screen.  They  did  not  see  Anthony  sitting  under  the  ash- 
tree,  they  did  not  hear  him,  they  did  not  hear  Frances 
calling  to  him  to  come  in.  They  were  utterly  unaware 
of  Frances  and  Anthony. 

"  Ronny,"  he  said,  "  did  Michael  say  anything  to 
you  ? " 

"When?" 

"  This  afternoon,  when  he  made  you  come  with  him 
here?" 

"  How  do  you  mean,  '  say  anything '  ?  " 

"  You  know  what  I  mean." 

"Mich?" 

"  Yes.     Did  he  ask  you  to  marry  him  ?  " 

"  No.  He  said  a  lot  of  funny  things,  but  he  didn't 
say  that.     He  wouldn't." 

"  Why  wouldn't  he  ?  " 

"  Because  —  he  just  wouldn't." 

"  Well,  he  says  he  understands  you." 

"  Then,"  said  Veronica  conclusively,  "  of  course  he 
wouldn't." 

"  Yes ;  but  he  says  I  don't." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  275 

"  Dear  Nicky,  you  understand  me  when  nobody  else 
does.     You  always  did." 

"  Yes,  when  we  were  kids.  But  supposing  now  I  ever 
didn't,  would  it  matter?  You  see,  I'm  stupid,  and  car- 
ing —  caring  awfully  —  might  make  me  stupider.  Have 
people  got  to  understand  each  other  ?  " 

To  that  she  replied  astonishingly,  "  Are  you  quite  sure 
you  understand  about  Ferdie  ?  " 

"Ferdie?" 

"  Yes."  She  turned  her  face  full  to  him.  "  I  don't 
know  whether  you  know  about  it.  I  didn't  till  Mother 
told  me  the  other  day.     I'm  Ferdie's  daughter. 

"  Did  you  know  ?  " 

"  Oh,  Lord,  yes.  I've  known  it  for  —  oh,  simply  ever 
so  long." 

"Who  told  you?" 

"  Dorothy,  I  think.  But  I  guessed  it  because  of  some- 
thing he  said  once  about  seeing  ghosts." 

"  I  wonder  if  you  know  how  I  feel  about  it  ?  I  want 
you  to  understand  that.  I'm  not  a  bit  ashamed  of  it.  I'm 
proud.  I'm  glad  I'm  Ferdie's  daughter,  not  Bartie's  .  .  . 
I'd  take  his  name,  so  that  everybody  should  know  I  was 
his  daughter,  only  that  I  like  Uncle  Anthony's  name  best. 
I'm  glad  Mother  loved  him." 

"  So  am  I,  Ronny.  I  know  I  shouldn't  have  liked  Bar- 
tie's  daughter.  Bartie's  daughter  wouldn't  have  been 
you." 

He  took  her  in  his  arms  and  held  her  face  against  his 
face.     And  it  was  as  if  Desmond  had  never  been. 

A  little  while  ago  he  had  hated  Desmond  because  she 


276  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

had  come  before  Veronica;  she  had  taken  what  belonged 
to  Veronica,  the  first  tremor  of  his  passion,  the  irrecover- 
able delight  and  surprise.  And  now  he  knew  that,  because 
he  had  not  loved  her,  she  had  taken  nothing. 

"  Do  you  love  me  ?  " 

"  Do  you  love  me  ?  " 

"  You  know  I  love  you." 

"  You  know.     You  know." 

What  they  said  was  new  and  wonderful  to  them  as  if 
nobody  before  them  had  ever  thought  of  it. 

Yet  that  night,  all  over  the  Heath,  in  hollows  under  the 
birch-trees,  and  on  beds  of  trampled  grass,  young  lovers 
lay  in  each  other's  arms  and  said  the  same  thing  in  the 
same  words :  "  Do  you  love  me  ?  "  "  You  know  I  love 
you !  "  over  and  over,  in  voices  drowsy  and  thick  with 
love. 

"  There's  one  thing  I  haven't  thought  of,"  said  Nicky. 
"  And  that's  that  damned  strike.  If  it  hits  Daddy  badly 
we  may  have  to  wait  goodness  knows  how  long.  Ages  we 
may  have  to." 

"  I'd  wait  all  my  life  if  I  could  have  you  in  the  last  five 
seconds  of  it.     And  if  I  couldn't,  I'd  still  wait." 

And  presently  Veronica  remembered  Michael. 

"  Why  did  you  ask  me  whether  Mick  had  said  any- 
thing?" 

"  Because  I  thought  you  ought  to  know  about  it  before 

you Besides,  if  he  had,  we  should  have  had  to  wait 

a  bit  before  we  told  him." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  277. 

It  seemed  that  there  was  nothing  to  prevent  them  mar- 
rying to-morrow  if  they  liked.  The  strike,  Anthony  said, 
couldn't  hit  him  as  badly  as  all  that. 

He  and  Frances  sat  up  till  long  past  midnight,  talking 
about  their  plans,  and  the  children's  plans.  It  was  all 
settled.  The  first  week  in  August  they  would  go  down 
to  Morfe  for  the  shooting.  They  would  stay  there  till  the 
first  week  in  September.  Nicky  and  Veronica  would  be 
married  the  first  week  in  October.  And  they  would  go 
to  France  and  Belgium  and  Germany  for  their  honey- 
moon. 


XIX 

They  did  not  go  down  to  Morfe  the  first  week  in  August 
for  the  shooting. 

Neither  did  Lawrence  Stephen  go  to  Ireland  on  Mon- 
day, the  third.  At  the  moment  when  he  should  have  been 
receiving  the  congratulations  of  the  Dublin  Nationalists 
after  his  impassioned  appeal  for  militant  consolidation, 
Mr.  Redmond  and  Sir  Edward  Carson  were  shaking  hands 
dramatically  in  the  House  of  Commons.  Stephen's  sub- 
lime opportunity,  the  civil  war,  had  been  snatched  from 
him  by  the  unforeseen. 

And  there  was  no  chance  of  Nicky  and  Veronica  going 
to  Belgium  and  France  and  Germany  for  their  honey- 
moon. 

For  within  nine  days  of  Frances's  Day  Germany  had 
declared  war  on  France  and  Russia,  and  was  marching 
over  the  Belgian  frontier  on  her  way  to  Paris. 

Frances,  aroused  at  last  to  realization  of  the  affairs  of 
nations,  asked,  like  several  million  women,  "  What  does 
it  mean  ?  " 

And  Anthony,  like  several  million  men,  answered,  "  It 
means  Armageddon."  Like  several  million  people,  they 
both  thought  he  was  saying  something  as  original  as  it  was 
impressive,  something  clear  and  final  and  descriptive. 

"  Armageddon  !  "  Stolid,  unimaginative  people  wont 
about  saying  it  to  each  other.     The  sound  of  the  word 

278 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  279 

thrilled  them,  intoxicated  them,  gave  them  an  awful  feel- 
ing that  was  at  the  same  time,  in  some  odd  way,  agreeable ; 
it  stirred  them  with  a  solemn  and  sombre  passion.  They 
said  "  Armageddon.  It  means  Armageddon."  Yet  no- 
body knew  and  nobody  asked  or  thought  of  asking  what 
Armageddon  meant. 

"  Shall  We  come  into  it  ?  "  said  Frances.  She  was 
thinking  of  the  Royal  Navy  turning  out  to  the  last  de- 
stroyer to  save  England  from  invasion;  of  the  British 
Army  most  superfluously  prepared  to  defend  England 
from  the  invader,  who,  after  all,  could  not  invade;  of 
Indian  troops  pouring  into  England  if  the  worst  came  to 
the  worst.  She  had  the  healthy  British  mind  that  refuses 
and  always  has  refused  to  acknowledge  the  possibility  of 
disaster.  Yet  she  asked  continually,  "  Would  England 
be  drawn  in  ?  "  She  was  thankful  that  none  of  her  sons 
had  gone  into  the  Army  or  the  Navy.  Whoever  else  was 
in,  they  would  be  out  of  it. 

At  first  Anthony  said,  "  No.  Of  course  England 
wouldn't  be  drawn  in." 

Then,  on  the  morning  of  England's  ultimatum,  the  clos- 
ing of  the  Stock  Exchange  and  the  Banks  made  him 
thoughtful,  and  he  admitted  that  it  looked  as  if  England 
might  be  drawn  in  after  all.  The  long  day,  without  any 
business  for  him  and  Nicholas,  disturbed  him.  There 
was  a  nasty,  hovering  smell  of  ruin  in  the  air.  But  there 
was  no  panic.  The  closing  of  the  Banks  was  only  a  wise 
precaution  against  panic.  And  by  evening,  as  the  tre- 
mendous significance  of  the  ultimatum  sank  into  him,  he 
said  definitively  that  England  would  not  be  drawn  in. 

Then  Drayton,   whom  they  had  not  seen  for  months 


280  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

(since  he  had  had  his  promotion)  telephoned  to  Dorothy 
to  come  and  dine  with  him  at  his  club  in  Dover  Street. 
Anthony  missed  altogether  the  significance  of  that. 

He  had  actually  made  for  himself  an  after-dinner  peace 
in  which  coffee  could  be  drunk  and  cigarettes  smoked  as 
if  nothing  were  happening  to  Europe. 

"  England,"  he  said,  "  will  not  be  drawn  in,  because 
her  ultimatum  will  stop  the  War.  There  won't  be  any 
Armageddon." 

"  Oh,  won't  there !  "  said  Michael.  "  And  I  can  tell 
you  there  won't  be  much  left  of  us  after  it's  over." 

He  had  been  in  Germany  and  he  knew.  He  carried 
himself  with  a  sort  of  stern  haughtiness,  as  one  who  knew 
better  than  any  of  them.  And  yet  his  words  conveyed 
no  picture  to  his  brain,  no  definite  image  of  anything 
at  all. 

But  in  Nicholas's  brain  images  gathered  fast,  one  after 
another;  they  thickened;  clear,  vivid  images  with  hard 
outlines.  They  came  slowly  but  with  order  and  pre- 
cision. While  the  others  talked  he  had  been  silent  and 
very  grave. 

"  Some  of  us'll  be  left,"  he  said.  "  But  it'll  take  us 
all  our  time." 

Anthony  looked  thoughtfully  at  Nicholas.  A  sudden 
wave  of  realization  beat  up  against  his  consciousness  and 
receded. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  "  we  shall  know  at  midnight." 

An  immense  restlessness  came  over  them. 
At  a  quarter-past  eight  Dorothy  telephoned  from  her 
club  in  Grafton  street.     Frank  had  had  to  leave  her  sud- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  281 

denly.  Somebody  had  sent  for  him.  And  if  they  wanted 
to  see  the  sight  of  their  lives  they  were  to  come  into  town 
at  once.  St.  James's  was  packed  with  people  from  White- 
hall to  Buckingham  Palace.  It  was  like  nothing  on  earth, 
and  they  mustn't  miss  it.  She'd  wait  for  them  in  Grafton 
Street  till  a  quarter  to  nine,  but  not  a  minute  later. 

Nicky  got  out  his  big  four-seater  Morss  car.  They 
packed  themselves  into  it,  all  six  of  them  somehow,  and 
he  drove  them  into  London.  They  had  a  sense  of  doing 
something  strange  and  memorable  and  historic. 

Dorothy,  picked  up  at  her  club,  showed  nothing  but  a 
pleasurable  excitement.  She  gave  no  further  information 
about  Frank.  He  had  had  to  go  off  and  see  somebody. 
What  did  he  think?  He  thought  what  he  had  always 
thought;  only  he  wouldn't  talk  about  it. 

Dorothy  was  not  inclined  to  talk  about  it  either. 

The  Morss  was  caught  in  a  line  blocked  at  the  bottom 
of  Albemarle  Street  by  two  streams  of  cars,  mixed  with 
two  streams  of  foot  passengers,  that  poured  steadily  from 
Piccadilly  into  St.  James's  Street. 

Michael  and  Dorothy  got  out  and  walked.  Nicholas 
gave  up  his  place  to  Anthony  and  followed  with  Veronica. 

Their  restlessness  had  been  a  part  of  the  immense  rest- 
lessness of  the  crowd.  They  were  drawn,  as  the  crowd 
was  drawn;  they  went  as  the  crowd  went,  up  and  down, 
restlessly,  from  Trafalgar  Square  and  Whitehall  to  Buck- 
ingham Palace;  from  Buckingham  Palace  to  Whitehall 
and  Trafalgar  Square.  They  drifted  down  Parliament 
Street  to  Westminster  and  back  again.  An  hour  ago  the 
drifting,  nebulous  crowd  had  split,  torn  asunder  between 
two  attractions;  its  two  masses  had  wheeled  away,  one  to 


282  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

the  east  and  the  other  to  the  west ;  they  had  gathered  them- 
selves together,  one  at  each  pole  of  the  space  it  now  trav- 
ersed. The  great  meeting  in  Trafalgar  Square  balanced 
the  multitude  that  had  gravitated  towards  Buckingham 
Palace,  to  see  the  King  and  Queen  come  out  on  their  bal- 
cony and  show  themselves  to  their  people. 

And  as  the  edges  of  the  two  masses  gave  way,  each 
broke  and  scattered,  and  was  mixed  again  with  the  other. 
Like  a  flood,  confined  and  shaken,  it  surged  and  was 
driven  back  and  surged  again  from  Whitehall  to  Bucking- 
ham Palace,  from  Buckingham  Palace  to  Whitehall.  It 
looked  for  an  outlet  in  the  narrow  channels  of  the  side- 
streets,  or  spread  itself  over  the  flats  of  the  Green  Park, 
only  to  return  restlessly  upon  itself,  sucked  back  by  the 
main  current  in  the  Mall. 

It  was  as  if  half  London  had  met  there  for  Bank  Holi- 
day. Part  of  this  crowd  was  drunk;  it  was  orgiastic;  it 
made  strange,  fierce  noises,  like  the  noises  of  one  enor- 
mous, mystically  excited  beast;  here  and  there,  men  and 
women,  with  inflamed  and  drunken  faces,  reeled  in  each 
other's  arms ;  they  wore  pink  paper  feathers  in  their  hats. 
Some,  only  half  intoxicated,  flicked  at  each  other  with 
long  streamers  of  pink  and  white  paper,  carried  like 
scourges  on  small  sticks.     These  were  the  inspired. 

But  the  great  body  of  the  crowd  was  sober.  It  went 
decorously  in  a  long  procession,  young  men  with  their 
sweethearts,  friends,  brothers  and  sisters,  husbands  and 
wives,  fathers  and  mothers  with  their  children ;  none,  or 
very  few,  went  alone  that  night. 

It  was  an  endless  procession  of  faces ;  grave  and 
thoughtful  faces;  uninterested,  respectable  faces;  faces  of 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  283 

unmoved  integrity;  excited  faces;  dreaming,  wondering, 
bewildered  faces;  faces  merely  curious,  or  curiously  ex- 
alted, slightly  ecstatic,  open-mouthed,  fascinated  by  each 
other  and  by  the  movements  and  the  lights ;  laughing, 
frivolous  faces,  and  faces  utterly  vacant  and  unseeing. 

On  every  other  breast  there  was  a  small  Union  Jack 
pinned ;  every  other  hand  held  and  waggled  a  Union  Jack. 
The  Union  Jack  flew  from  the  engine  of  every  other  auto- 
mobile. In  twelve  hours,  out  of  nowhere,  thousands  and 
thousands  of  flags  sprang  magically  into  being;  as  if  for 
years  London  had  been  preparing  for  this  day. 

And  in  and  out  of  this  crowd  the  train  of  automobiles 
with  their  flags  dashed  up  and  down  the  Mall  for  hours, 
appearing  and  disappearing.  Intoxicated  youths  with  in- 
flamed faces,  in  full  evening  dress,  squatted  on  the  roofs 
of  taxi-cabs  or  rode  astride  on  the  engines  of  their  cars, 
waving  flags. 

All  this  movement,  drunken,  orgiastic,  somnambu- 
listic, mysteriously  restless,  streamed  up  and  down  be- 
tween two  solemn  and  processional  lines  of  lights,  two 
solemn  and  processional  lines  of  trees,  lines  that  stretched 
straight  from  Whitehall  to  Buckingham  Palace  in  a  re- 
current pattern  of  trees  and  lamps,  dark  trees,  twilit  trees, 
a  lamp  and  a  tree  shining  with  a  metallic  unnatural  green ; 
and,  at  the  end  of  the  avenue,  gilded  gates  and  a  golden- 
white  fagade. 

The  crowd  was  drifting  now  towards  the  Palace. 
Michael  and  Dorothea,  Nicholas  and  Veronica,  went  with 
it.  In  this  eternal  perambulation  they  met  people  that 
they  knew;  Stephen  and  Vera;  Mitchell,  Monier-Owen; 
Uncle  Morrie  and  his  sisters.     Anthony,  looking  rather 


284  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

solemn,  drove  past  them  in  his  car.  It  was  like  impossi- 
ble, grotesque  encounters  in  a  dream. 

Outside  the  Palace  the  crowd  moved  up  and  down 
without  rest ;  it  drifted  and  returned ;  it  circled  round  and 
round  the  fountain.  In  the  open  spaces  the  intoxicated 
motor-cars  and  taxi-cabs  darted  and  tore  with  the  folly 
of  moths  and  the  fury  of  destroyers.  They  stung  the  air 
with  their  hooting.  Flags,  intoxicated  flags,  still  hung 
from  their  engines.  They  came  flying  drunkenly  out  of 
the  dark,  like  a  trumpeting  swarm  of  enormous  insects, 
irresistibly,  incessantly  drawn  to  the  lights  of  the  Palace, 
hypnotized  by  the  golden-white  facade. 

Suddenly,  Michael's  soul  revolted. 

"  If  this  demented  herd  of  swine  is  a  great  people  go- 
ing into  a  great  war,  God  help  us !  Beasts  —  it's  not  as 
if  their  bloated  skins  were  likely  to  be  punctured." 

He  called  back  over  his  shoulders  to  the  others. 

"  Let's  get  out  of  this.     If  we  don't  I  shall  be  sick." 

He  took  Dorothy  by  her  arm  and  shouldered  his  way 
out. 

The  water  had  ceased  playing  in  the  fountain. 

Nicholas  and  Veronica  stood  by  the  fountain.  The  wa- 
ter in  the  basin  was  green  like  foul  sea-water.  The  jet- 
sam of  the  crowd  floated  there.  A  small  child  leaned 
over  the  edge  of  the  basin  and  fished  for  Union  Jacks  in 
the  filthy  pool.  Its  young  mother  held  it  safe  by  the 
tilted  edge  of  its  petticoats.  She  looked  up  at  them  and 
smiled.     They  smiled  back  again  and  turned  away. 

It  was  quiet  on  the  south  side  by  the  Barracks.  Small, 
sober  groups  of  twos  and  threes  strolled  there,  or  stood 
with  their  faces  pressed  close  against  the  railings,  peer- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  285 

ing  into  the  barrack  yard.  Motionless,  earnest  and  atten- 
tive, they  stared  at  the  men  in  khaki  moving  about  on  the 
other  side  of  the  railings.  They  were  silent,  fascinated 
by  the  men  in  khaki.  Standing  safe  behind  the  railing, 
they  stared  at  them  with  an  awful,  sombre  curiosity. 
And  the  men  in  khaki  stared  back,  proud,  self-con- 
scious, as  men  who  know  that  the  hour  is  great  and  that 
it  is  their  hour. 

"  Nicky,"  Veronica  said,  "  I  wish  Michael  wouldn't 
say  things  like  that." 

"  He's  dead  right,  Ronny.  That  isn't  the  way  to  take 
it,  getting  drunk  and  excited,  and  rushing  about  making 
silly  asses  of  themselves.  They  are  rather  swine,  you 
know." 

"  Yes ;  but  they're  pathetic.  Can't  you  see  how  pa- 
thetic they  are  ?  Nicky,  I  believe  I  love  the  swine  — 
even  the  poor  drunken  ones  with  the  pink  paper  feathers 
—  just  because  they're  English  ;  because  awful  things  are 
going  to  happen  to  them,  and  they  don't  know  it.  They're 
English." 

"  You  think  God's  made  us  all  like  that  ?  He 
hasn't." 

They  found  Anthony  in  the  Mall,  driving  up  and 
down,  looking  for  them.  He  had  picked  up  Dorothy  and 
Aunt  Emmeline  and  Uncle  Morrie. 

"  We're  going  down  to  the  Mansion  House,"  he  said, 
"  to  hear  the  Proclamation.     "Will  you  come  ?  " 

But  Vera  and  Nicholas  were  tired  of  crowds,  even  of 
historic  crowds.  Anthony  drove  off  with  his  car-load, 
and  they  went  home. 

"  I  never  saw  Daddy  so  excited,"  Nicky  said. 


286  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

But  x\nthony  was  not  excited.  He  had  never  felt 
calmer  or  cooler  in  his  life. 

Ho  returned  some  time  after  midnight.  By  that  time 
it  had  sunk  into  him.  Germany  had  defied  the  ulti- 
matum and  England  had  declared  war  on  Germany. 

He  said  it  was  only  what  was  to  be  foreseen.  He  had 
known  all  the  time  that  it  would  happen  —  really. 

The  tension  of  the  day  of  the  ultimatum  had  this  pecul- 
iar psychological  effect  that  all  over  England  people  who 
had  declared  up  to  the  last  minute  that  there  would  be  no 
War  were  saying  the  same  thing  as  Anthony  and  believ- 
ing it. 

Michael  was  disgusted  with  the  event  that  had  put  an 
end  to  the  Irish  Revolution.  It  was  in  this  form  that  he 
conceived  his  first  grudge  against  the  War. 

This  emotion  of  his  was  like  some  empty  space  of 
horror  opened  up  between  him  and  Nicholas;  Nicky  be- 
ing the  only  one  of  his  family  who  was  as  yet  aware  of 
its  existence. 

For  the  next  three  days,  Nicholas,  very  serious  and 
earnest,  shut  himself  up  in  his  workshop  at  the  bottom  of 
the  orchard  and  laboured  there,  putting  the  last  touches 
to  the  final,  perfect,  authoritative  form  of  the  Moving 
Fortress,  the  joint  creation  of  his  brain  and  Drayton's, 
the  only  experiment  that  had  survived  the  repeated  on- 
slaughts of  the  Major's  criticism.  The  new  model  was 
three  times  the  size  of  the  lost  original;  it  was  less  like  a 
battleship  and  more  like  a  racing-car  and  a  destroyer. 
It  was  his  and  Drayton's  last  word  on  the  subject  of  arm- 
aments. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  287 

It  was  going  to  the  War  Office,  this  time,  addressed  to 
the  right  person,  and  accompanied  by  all  sorts  of  pro- 
tective introductions,  and  Drayton  blasting  its  way  be- 
fore it  with  his  new  explosive. 

In  those  three  days  Nick  found  an  immense  distraction 
in  his  Moving  Fortress.  It  also  served  to  blind  his  fam- 
ily to  his  real  intentions.  He  knew  that  his  real  inten- 
tions could  not  be  kept  from  them  very  long.  Meanwhile 
the  idea  that  he  was  working  on  something  made  them 
happy.  When  Frances  saw  him  in  his  overalls  she 
smiled  and  said:  "  Nicky's  got  his  job,  anyhow."  John 
came  and  looked  at  him  through  the  window  of  the  work- 
shop and  laughed. 

"  Good  old  Nicky,"  he  said.     "  Doing  his  bit!  " 

In  those  three  days  John  went  about  with  an  air  of 
agreeable  excitement.  Or  you  came  upon  him  sitting  in 
solitary  places  like  the  dining-room,  lost  in  happy  thought. 
Michael  said  of  him  that  he  was  unctuous.  He  exuded 
a  secret  joy  and  satisfaction.  John  had  acquired  a  sud- 
den remarkable  maturity.  He  shone  on  each  member 
of  his  family  with  benevolence  and  affection,  as  if  he  were 
its  protector  and  consoler,  and  about  to  confer  on  it  some 
tremendous  benefit. 

"  Look  at  Don-Don,"  Michael  said.  "  The  bloodthirsty 
little  brute.     He's  positively  enjoying  the  War." 

"  You  might  leave  me  alone,"  said  Don-Don.  "  I 
shan't  have  it  to  enjoy  for  long." 

He  was  one  of  those  who  believed  that  the  War  would 
be  over  in  four  months. 

Michael,  pledged  to  secrecy,  came  and  looked  at  the 
Moving  Fortress.     He  was  interested  and  intelligent;  he 


288  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

admired  that  efficiency  of  Nicky's  that  was  so  unlike  his 
own. 

Yet,  he  wondered,  after  all,  was  it  so  unlike  ?  He,  too, 
was  aiming  at  an  art  as  clean  and  hard  and  powerful  as 
Nicky's,  as  naked  of  all  blazonry  and  decoration,  an  art 
which  would  attain  its  objective  by  the  simplest,  most 
perfect  adjustment  of  means  to  ends. 

And  Anthony  was  proud  of  that  hidden  wonder  locked 
behind  the  door  of  the  workshop  in  the  orchard.  He 
realized  that  his  son  Nicholas  had  taken  part  in  a  great 
and  important  thing.  He  was  prouder  of  Nicholas  than 
he  had  been  of  Michael. 

And  Michael  knew  it. 

Nicky's  brains  could  be  used  for  the  service  of  his 
country. 

But  Michael's  ?  Anthony  said  to  himself  that  there 
wasn't  any  sense  —  any  sense  that  he  could  endure  to  con- 
template —  in  which  Michael's  brains  could  be  of  any 
use  to  his  country.  When  Anthony  thought  of  the  mo- 
bilization of  his  family  for  national  service,  Michael  and 
Michael's  brains  were  a  problem  that  he  put  behind  him 
for  the  present  and  refused  to  contemplate.  There 
would  be  time  enough  for  Michael  later. 

Anthony  was  perfectly  well  aware  of  his  own  one  tal- 
ent, the  talent  which  had  made  "  Harrison  and  Harri- 
son "  the  biggest  timber-importing  firm  in  England.  If 
there  was  one  thing  he  understood  it  was  organization. 
If  there  was  one  thing  he  could  not  tolerate  it  was  waste  of 
good  material,  the  folly  of  forcing  men  and  women  into 
places  they  were  not  fit  for.  He  had  let  his  eldest  son 
slip  out  of  the  business  without  a  pang,  or  with  hardly 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  289 

any  pang.  He  had  only  taken  Nicholas  into  it  as  an 
experiment.  It  was  on  John  that  he  relied  to  inherit  it 
and  carry  it  farther. 

As  a  man  of  business  he  approved  of  the  advertised 
formula :  "  Business  as  Usual."  He  understood  it  to 
mean  that  the  duty  which  England  expected  every  man 
to  do  was  to  stay  in  the  place  he  was  most  fitted  for  and 
to  go  where  he  was  most  wanted.  Nothing  but  muddle 
and  disaster  could  follow  any  departure  from  this  rule. 

It  was  fitting  that  Frances  and  Veronica  should  do 
Red  Cross  work.  It  was  fitting  that  Dorothy  should  help 
to  organize  the  relief  of  the  Belgium  refugees.  It  was 
fitting  that  John  should  stay  at  home  and  carry  on  the 
business,  and  that  he,  Anthony,  should  enlist  when  he  had 
6ettled  John  into  his  place.  It  was,  above  all,  fitting 
that  Nicky  should  devote  himself  to  the  invention  and 
manufacture  of  armaments.  He  could  not  conceive  any- 
thing more  wantonly  and  scandalously  wasteful  than  a 
system  that  could  make  any  other  use  of  Nicky's  brains. 
He  thanked  goodness  that,  with  a  European  War  upon 
us,  such  a  system,  if  it  existed,  would  not  be  allowed  to  live 
a  day. 

As  for  Michael,  it  might  be  fitting  later  —  very  much 
later  —  perhaps.  If  Michael  wanted  to  volunteer  for 
the  Army  then,  and  if  it  were  necessary,  he  would  have 
no  right  to  stop  him.  But  it  would  not  be  necessary. 
England  was  going  to  win  this  War  on  the  sea  and  not 
on  land.     Michael  was  practically  safe. 

And  behind  Frances's  smile,  and  John's  laughter,  and 
Michael's  admiration,  and  Anthony's  pride  there  was  the 
thought :     "  Whatever  happens,  Nicky  willl  be  safe." 


290  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  the  model  of  the  Moving  Fortress  was  packed 
up  —  Veronica  and  Nicky  packed  it  —  and  it  was  sent 
under  high  protection  to  the  War  Office.  And  Nicky 
unlocked  the  door  of  his  workshop  and  rested  restlessly 
from  his  labour. 

And  there  was  a  call  for  recruits,  and  for  still  more 
recruits. 

Westminster  Bridge  became  a  highway  for  regiments 
marching  to  battle.  The  streets  were  parade-grounds  for 
squad  after  squad  of  volunteers  in  civilian  clothes,  self- 
conscious  and  abashed  under  the  eyes  of  the  men  in 
khaki. 

And  Michael  said :  "  This  is  the  end  of  all  the  arts. 
Artists  will  not  be  allowed  to  exist  except  as  agents  for 
the  recruiting  sergeant.     We're  dished." 

That  was  the  second  grudge  he  had  against  the  War. 
It  killed  the  arts  in  the  very  hour  of  their  renaissance. 
"  Eccentricities  "  by  Morton  Ellis,  with  illustrations  by 
Austin  Mitchell,  and  the  "  New  Poems  "  of  Michael  Har- 
rison, with  illustrations  by  Austin  Mitchell,  were  to  have 
come  out  in  September.  But  it  was  not  conceivable  that 
they  should  come  out. 

At  the  first  rumour  of  the  ultimatum  Michael  and 
Ellis  had  given  themselves  up  for  lost. 

Liege  fell  and  Namur  was  falling. 

And  the  call  went  on  for  recruits,  and  for  still  more 
recruits.  And  Nicky  in  five  seconds  had  destroyed  his 
mother's  illusions  and  the  whole  fabric  of  his  father's 
plans. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  291 

It  was  one  evening  when  they  were  in  the  drawing- 
room,  sitting  up  after  Veronica  had  gone  to  bed. 

"I  hope  you  won't  mind,  Father,"  he  said;  "but  I'm 
going  to  enlist  to-morrow." 

He  did  not  look  at  his  father's  face.  He  looked  at  his 
mother's.  She  was  sitting  opposite  him  on  the  couch  be- 
side Dorothy.  John  balanced  himself  on  the  head  of  the 
couch  with  his  arm  round  his  mother's  shoulder.  Every 
now  and  then  he  stooped  down  and  rubbed  his  cheek 
thoughtfully  against  her  hair. 

A  slight  tremor  shook  her  sensitive,  betraying  upper 
lip;  then  she  looked  back  at  Nicholas  and  smiled. 

Dorothy  set  her  mouth  hard,  unsmiling. 

Anthony  had  said  nothing.  He  stared  before  him  at 
Michael's  foot,  thrust  out  and  tilted  by  the  crossing  of 
his  knees.  Michael's  foot,  with  its  long,  arched  instep, 
fascinated  Anthony.  He  seemed  to  be  thinking:  "  If  I 
look  at  it  long  enough  I  may  forget  what  Nicky  has 
said." 

"  I  hope  you  won't  mind,  Father ;  but  I'm  enlisting 
too." 

John's  voice  was  a  light,  high  echo  of  Nicky's. 

With  a  great  effort  Anthony  roused  himself  from  his 
contemplation  of  Michael's  foot. 

"I  —  can't  —  see  —  that  my  minding  —  or  not  mind- 
ing —  has  anything  —  to  do  —  with  it." 

He  brought  his  words  out  slowly  and  with  separate 
efforts,  as  if  they  weighed  heavily  on  his  tongue. 
"  "We've  got  to  consider  what's  best  for  the  country  all 
round,  and  I  doubt  if  either  of  you  is  called  upon  to 
go." 


292  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Some  of  us  have  got  to  go,"  said  Nicky. 

"  Quite  so.  But  I  don't  think  it  ought  to  be  you, 
Nicky;  or  John,  either." 

"  I  suppose,"  said  Michael,  "  you  mean  it  ought  to  be 
me." 

"  I  don't  mean  anything  of  the  sort.  One  out  of 
four  's  enough." 

"  One  out  of  four  ?     Well  then  —  " 

"  That  only  leaves  me  to  fight,"  said  Dorothy. 

"  I  wasn't  thinking  of  you,  Michael.  Or  of  Doro- 
thy." 

They  all  looked  at  him  where  he  sat,  upright  and  noble, 
in  his  chair,  and  most  absurdly  young. 

Dorothy  said  under  her  breath :  "  Oh,  you  darling 
Daddy." 

"  You  won't  be  allowed  to  go,  anyhow,"  said  John  to 
his  father.     "  You  needn't  think  it." 

"  Why  not  ?  " 

"  Well ."     He  hadn't  the  heart  to  say :     "  Because 

you're  too  old." 

"  Nicky's  brains  will  be  more  use  to  the  country  than 
my  old  carcass." 

Nicky  thought:  "You're  the  very  last  of  us  that  can 
be  spared."  But  he  couldn't  say  it.  The  thing  was  so 
obvious.  All  he  said  was :  "  It's  out  of  the  question, 
your  going." 

"Old  Nicky's  out  of  the  question,  if  you  like,"  said 
John.  "  He's  going  to  be  married.  He  ought  to  be 
thinking  of  his  wife  and  children." 

"  Of  course  lie  ought,"  said  Anthony.  "  Whoever  goes 
first,  it  isn't  Nicky." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  293 

"  You  ought  to  think  of  Mummy,  Daddy  ducky ;  and 
you  ought  to  think  of  us"  said  Dorothy. 

"  I,"  said  John,  "  haven't  got  anybody  to  think  of. 
I'm  not  going  to  be  married,  and  I  haven't  any  children." 

"I  haven't  got  a  wife  and  children  yet,"  said  Nicky. 

"  You've  got  Veronica.     You  ought  to  think  of  her." 

"  I  am  thinking  of  her.  You  don't  suppose  Veron^ 
ica'd  stop  me  if  I  wanted  to  go  ?  Why,  she  wouldn't  look 
at  me  if  I  didn't  want  to  go." 

Suddenly  he  remembered  Michael. 

"  I  mean,"  he  said,  "  after  my  saying  that  I  was  go- 
ing." 

Their  eyes  met.  Michael's  flickered.  He  knew  that 
Nicky  was  thinking  of  him. 

"  Then  Ronny  knows  %  "  said  Frances. 

"  Of  course  she  knows.  You  aren't  going  to  try  to 
stop  me,  Mother  ?  " 

"  No,"  she  said.  "  I'm  not  going  to  try  to  stop  you 
—  this  time." 

She  thought :  "  If  I  hadn't  stopped  him  seven  years 
ago,  he  would  be  safe  now,  with  the  Army  in  India." 

One  by  one  they  got  up  and  said  "  Good  night  "  to  each 
other. 

But  Nicholas  came  to  Michael  in  his  room. 

He  said  to  him :  "  I  say,  Mick,  don't  you  worry  about 
not  enlisting.  At  any  rate,  not  yet.  Don't  worry  about 
Don  and  Daddy.  They  won't  take  Don  because  he's 
got  a  mitral  murmur  in  his  heart  that  he  doesn't  know 
about.  He's  going  to  be  jolly  well  sold,  poor  chap. 
And  they  won't  take  the  guv'nor  because  he's  too  old; 


294  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

though  the  dear  old  thing  thinks  he  can  bluff  them  into 
it  because  he  doesn't  look  it. 

"  And  look  here  —  don't  worry  about  me.  As  far  as 
I'm  concerned,  the  War's  a  blessing  in  disguise.  I  al- 
ways wanted  to  go  into  the  Army.  You  know  how  1 
loathed  it  when  they  went  and  stopped  me.  Now  I'm 
going  in  and  nobody  —  not  even  mother  —  really  wants 
to  keep  me  out.  Soon  they'll  all  be  as  pleased  as  Punch 
about  it. 

"  And  I  sort  of  know  how  you  feel  about  the  War. 
You  don't  want  to  stick  bayonets  into  German  tummies, 
just  because  they're  so  large  and  oodgy.  You'd  think 
of  that  first  and  all  the  time  and  afterwards.  And  I 
shan't  think  of  it  at  all. 

"  Besides,  you  disapprove  of  the  War  for  all  sorts  of 
reasons  that  I  can't  get  hold  of.  But  it's  like  this  — 
you  couldn't  respect  yourself  if  you  went  into  it;  and  I 
couldn't  respect  myself  if  I  stayed  out." 

"  I  wonder,"  Michael  said,  "  if  you  really  see  it." 

"  Of  course  I  see  it.  That's  the  worst  of  you  clever 
writing  chaps.  You  seem  to  think  nobody  can  ever  see 
anything  except  yourselves." 

When  he  had  left  him  Michael  thought :  "  I  wonder 
if  he  really  does  see  ?     Or  if  he  made  it  all  up  ?  " 

They  had  not  said  to  each  other  all  that  they  had 
really  meant.  Of  Nicky's  many  words  there  were  only 
two  that  he  remembered  vividly,  "  Not  yet." 

Again  he  felt  the  horror  of  the  great  empty  space 
opened  up  between  him  and  Nicky,  deep  and  still  and 
soundless,  but  for  the  two  words :     "  Not  yet." 


XX 

It  was  as  Nicholas  had  said.  Anthony  and  John  were 
rejected;  Anthony  on  account  of  his  age,  John  because 
of  the  mitral  murmur  that  he  didn't  know  about. 

The  guv'nor  had  lied,  John  said,  like  a  good  'un; 
swore  he  was  under  thirty-five  and  stuck  to  it.  He 
might  have  had  a  chance  if  he'd  left  it  at  that,  because 
he  looked  a  jolly  sight  better  than  most  of  'em  when  he 
was  stripped.  But  they'd  given  him  so  good  an  innings 
that  the  poor  old  thing  got  above  himself,  and  spun  them 
a  yarn  about  his  hair  having  gone  grey  from  a  recent 
shock.  That  dished  him.  They  said  they  knew  that 
sort  of  hair ;  they'd  been  seeing  a  lot  of  it  lately. 

Anthony  was  depressed.  He  said  bitter  things  about 
"  red  tape,"  and  declared  that  if  that  was  the  way  things 
were  going  to  be  managed  it  was  a  bad  look-out  for  the 
country.  John  was  furious.  He  said  the  man  who  ex- 
amined him  was  a  blasted  idiot  who  didn't  know  his  own 
rotten  business.  He'd  actually  had  the  beastly  cheek 
to  tell  him  they  didn't  want  him  dropping  down  dead 
when  he  went  into  action,  or  fainting  from  sheer  excite- 
ment after  they'd  been  to  the  trouble  and  expense  of 
training  him.  As  if  he'd  be  likely  to  do  a  damn  silly 
thing  like  that.  He'd  never  been  excited  in  his  life.  It 
was  enough  to  give  him  heart-disease. 

So  John  and  Anthony  followed  the  example  of  their 

295 


296  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

women,  and  joined  the  ambulance  classes  of  the  Red 
Cross.  And  presently  they  learned  to  their  disgust  that, 
though  they  might  possibly  be  accepted  as  volunteers  for 
Home  Service,  their  disabilities  would  keep  them  forever 
from  the  Front. 

At  this  point  Anthony's  attention  was  diverted  to  his 
business  by  a  sudden  Government  demand  for  timber. 
As  he  believed  that  the  War  would  be  over  in  four  months 
he  did  not,  at  first,  realize  the  personal  significance  of 
this.  Still,  there  could  be  no  doubt  that  its  immediate 
message  for  him  was  that  business  must  be  attended  to. 
He  had  not  attended  to  it  many  days  before  he  saw  that 
his  work  for  his  country  lay  there  under  his  hand,  in  his 
offices  and  his  stackyards  and  factories.  He  sighed  and 
sat  down  to  it,  and  turned  his  back  resolutely  on  the  glam- 
our of  the  Front.  The  particular  business  in  hand  had 
great  issues  and  a  fascination  of  its  own. 

And  his  son  John  sat  down  to  it  beside  him,  with  a 
devoted  body  and  a  brain  alive  to  the  great  issues,  but 
with  an  ungovernable  and  abstracted  soul. 

And  Xicky,  a  recruit  in  Kitchener's  Army,  went  rap- 
idly through  the  first  courses  of  his  training;  sleeping 
under  canvas;  marching  in  sun  and  wind  and  rain;  dig- 
ging trenches,  ankle-deep,  waist  high,  breast  high  in 
earth,  till  his  clear  skin  grew  clearer,  and  his  young,  hard 
body  harder  every  day. 

And  every  day  the  empty  spiritual  space  between  him 
and  Michael  widened. 

With  the  exception  of  Michael  and  old  Mrs.  Fleming, 
Anthony's  entire  family  had  offered  itself  to  its  country; 
it  was  mobilized  from  Frances  and  Anthony  down  to  the 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  297 

very  Aunties.  In  those  days  there  were  few  Red  Cross 
volunteers  who  were  not  sure  that  sooner  or  later  they 
would  be  sent  to  the  Front.  Their  only  fear  was  that 
they  might  not  be  trained  and  ready  when  the  moment 
of  the  summons  came.  Strong  young  girls  hustled  for 
the  best  places  at  the  ambulance  classes.  Fragile,  eld- 
erly women,  twitching  with  nervous  anxiety,  contended 
with  these  remorseless  ones  and  were  pushed  to  the  rear. 
Yet  they  went  on  contending,  sustained  by  their  ex- 
traordinary illusion. 

Aunt  Louie,  displaying  an  unexpected  and  premature 
dexterity  with  bandages,  was  convinced  that  she  would 
be  sent  to  the  Front  if  nobody  else  was.  Aunt  Emmeline 
and  Aunt  Edith,  in  states  of  cerebral  excitement,  while 
still  struggling  to  find  each  other's  arteries,  declared  that 
they  were  going  to  the  Front.  They  saw  no  earthly  rea- 
son why  they  should  not  go  there.  Uncle  Maurice 
haunted  the  Emergency  class-rooms  at  the  Polytechnic, 
wearing  an  Esmarch  triangular  bandage  round  his  neck, 
and  volunteered  as  an  instructor.  He  got  mixed  up 
with  his  bandages,  and  finally  consented  to  the  use  of  his 
person  as  a  lay-figure  for  practical  demonstrations  while 
he  waited  for  his  orders  to  go  to  the  Front. 

They  forebore  to  comment  on  the  palpable  absurdity  of 
each  other's  hopes. 

For,  with  the  first  outbreak  of  the  War,  the  three  Miss 
Flemings  had  ceased  from  mutual  recrimination.  They 
were  shocked  into  a  curious  gentleness  to  each  other. 
Every  evening  the  old  schoolroom  (Michael's  study)  was 
turned  into  a  Red  Cross  demonstration  hall,  and  there 
the  queer  sight  was  to  be  seen  of  Louie,  placable  and 


298  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

tender,  showing  Edith  over  and  over  again  how  to  ad- 
just a  scalp  bandage  on  Emmeline's  head,  and  of  Emme- 
line  motionless  for  hours  under  Edie's  little,  clumsy, 
pinching  fingers.  It  was  thus,  with  small  vibrations  of 
tenderness  and  charity,  that  they  responded  to  the  vast 
rhythm  of  the  War. 

And  Grannie,  immutable  in  her  aged  wisdom  and  ma- 
levolence, pushed  out  her  lower  lip  at  them. 

"  If  you  three  would  leave  off  that  folly  and  sit  down 
and  knit,  you  might  be  some  use,"  said  Grannie. 
"  Kitchener  says  that  if  every  woman  in  England 
knitted  from  morning  till  night  he  wouldn't  have  enough 
socks  for  his  Army." 

Grannie  knitted  from  morning  till  night.  She  knitted 
conspicuously,  as  a  protest  against  bandage  practice;  giv- 
ing to  her  soft  and  gentle  action  an  air  of  energy  inimical 
to  her  three  unmarried  daughters.  And  not  even  Louie 
had  the  heart  to  tell  her  that  all  her  knitting  had  to  be 
unravelled  overnight,  to  save  the  wool. 

"  A  set  of  silly  women,  getting  in  Kitchener's  way, 
and  wasting  khaki !  " 

Grannie  behaved  as  if  the  War  were  her  private 
and  personal  affair,  as  if  Kitchener  were  her  right-hand 
man,  and  all  the  other  women  were  interfering  with 
them. 

Yet  it  looked  as  if  all  the  women  would  be  mobilized 
before  all  the  men.  The  gates  of  Holloway  were  opened, 
and  Mrs.  Blathwaite  and  her  followers  received  a  free 
pardon  on  their  pledge  to  abstain  from  violence  during 
the  period  of  the  War.     And  instantly,  in  the  first  week 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  299 

of  war,  the  Suffrage  Unions  and  Leagues  and  Societies 
(already  organized  and  disciplined  by  seven  years'  me- 
thodical resistance)  presented  their  late  enemy,  the  Gov- 
ernment, with  an  instrument  of  national  service  made 
to  its  hand  and  none  the  worse  because  originally  de- 
vised for  its  torture  and  embarassment. 

The  little  vortex  of  the  Woman's  Movement  was  swept 
without  a  sound  into  the  immense  vortex  of  the  War. 
The  women  rose  up  all  over  England  and  went  into 
uniform. 

And  Dorothea  appeared  one  day  wearing  the  khaki 
tunic,  breeches  and  puttees  of  the  Women's  Service 
Corps.  She  had  joined  a  motor-ambulance  as  chauf- 
feur, driving  the  big  Morss  car  that  Anthony  had  given 
to  it.  Dorothea  really  had  a  chance  of  being  sent  to  Bel- 
gium before  the  end  of  the  month.  Meanwhile  she  con- 
voyed Belgian  refugees  from  Cannon  Street  Station. 

She  saw  nothing  before  her  as  yet.  Her  mind  was  like 
Cannon  Street  Station  —  a  dreadful  twilit  terminus  into 
which  all  the  horror  and  misery  of  Belgium  poured  and 
was  congested. 

Cannon  Street  Station.  Presently  it  was  as  if  she 
were  spending  all  of  her  life  that  counted  there;  as  if 
for  years  she  had  been  familiar  with  the  scene. 

Arch  upon  iron  arch,  and  girder  after  iron  girder  hold- 
ing up  the  blurred  transparency  of  the  roof.  Iron  rails 
running  under  the  long  roof,  that  was  like  the  roof  of  a 
tunnel  open  at  one  end.  By  day  a  greyish  light,  filtered 
through  smoke  and  grit  and  steam.  Lamps,  opaque 
white  globes,  hanging  in  the  thick  air  like  dead  moons. 
By  night  a  bluish  light,  and  large,  white  globes  grown 


3oo  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

opalescent  like  moons,  lit  again  to  a  ghastly,  ruinous  life. 

The  iron  breasts  of  engines,  huge  and  triumphant,  ad- 
vancing under  the  immense  fanlight  of  the  open  arch. 
Long  trains  of  carriages  packed  tight  with  packages,  with 
enormous  bundles;  human  heads  appearing,  here  and 
there,  above  the  swollen  curves  of  the  bundles;  human 
bodies  emerging  in  the  struggle  to  bring  forth  the  bundles 
through  the  narrow  doors. 

Tor  the  first  few  weeks  the  War  meant  to  Dorothea, 
not  bleeding  wounds  and  death,  but  just  these  train-loads 
of  refugees  —  just  this  one  incredible  spectacle  of  Belgium 
pouring  itself  into  Cannon  Street  Station.  Her  clear 
hard  mind  tried  and  failed  to  grasp  the  sequences  of 
which  the  final  act  was  the  daily  unloading  of  tons  of 
men,  women  and  children  on  Cannon  Street  platform. 
Yesterday  they  were  staggering  under  those  bundles 
along  their  straight,  flat  roads  between  the  everlasting 
rows  of  poplars;  their  towns  and  villages  flamed  and 
smoked  behind  them;  some  of  them,  goaded  like  tired 
cattle,  had  felt  German  bayonets  at  their  backs  —  yes- 
terday. And  this  morning  they  were  here,  brave  and 
gay,  smiling  at  Dorothea  as  she  carried  their  sick  on  her 
stretcher  and  their  small  children  in  her  arms. 

And  they  were  still  proud  of  themselves. 

A  little  girl  tripped  along  the  platform,  carrying  in 
one  hand  a  large  pasteboard  box  covered  with  black  oil- 
cloth, and  in  the  other  a  cage  with  a  goldfinch  in  it.  She 
looked  back  at  Dorothea  and  smiled,  proud  of  herself  be- 
cause she  had  saved  her  goldfinch.  A  Belgium  boy  car- 
ried a  paralyzed  old  man  on  his  shoulders.  He  grinned 
at  Dorothea,  proud  of  himself  because  he  had  saved  his 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  301 

grandfather.  A  young  Flemish  peasant  woman  pushed 
back  the  shawl  that  covered  her  baby's  face  to  show  her 
how  pretty  he  was;  she  laughed  because  she  had  borne 
him  and  saved  him. 

And  there  were  terrible  things  significant  of  yesterday. 
Women  and  girls  idiotic  with  outrage  and  grief.  A 
young  man  lamed  in  trying  to  throw  himself  into  a  mov- 
ing train  because  he  thought  his  lost  mother  was  in  it. 
The  ring  screening  the  agony  of  a  woman  giving  birth 
to  her  child  on  the  platform.  A  death  in  the  train ;  stiff, 
upturned  feet  at  the  end  of  a  stretcher  that  the  police- 
ambulance  carried  away. 

And  as  Dorothea  drove  her  car-loads  of  refugees  day 
after  day  in  perfect  safety,  she  sickened  with  impatience 
and  disgust.  Safety  was  hard  and  bitter  to  her.  Her 
hidden  self  was  unsatisfied;  it  had  a  monstrous  longing. 
It  wanted  to  go  where  the  guns  sounded  and  the  shells 
burst,  and  the  villages  flamed  and  smoked;  to  go  along 
the  straight,  flat  roads  between  the  poplars  where  the  refu- 
gees had  gone,  so  that  her  nerves  and  flesh  should 
know  and  feel  their  suffering  and  their  danger.  She 
was  not  feeling  anything  now  except  the  shame  of  her 
immunity. 

She  thought :  "  I  can't  look  at  a  Belgian  woman  with- 
out wishing  I  were  dead.  I  shall  have  no  peace  till  I've 
gone." 

Her  surface  self  was  purely  practical.  She  thought: 
"  If  I  were  in  Belgium  I  could  get  them  out  of  it  quicker 
than  they  could  walk." 

Dorothea  could  bring  all  her  mind  to  bear  on  her  Bel- 
gians,  because   it   was   at   ease   about   her   own   people. 


302  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

They,  at  any  rate,  were  safe.  Her  father  and  poor  Don 
were  out  of  it.  Michael  was  not  in  it  —  yet ;  though  of 
course  he  would  be  in  it  some  time.  She  tried  not  to 
think  too  much  about  Michael.  Nicky  was  safe  for  the 
next  six  months.  And  Frank  was  safe.  Frank  was 
training  recruits.  He  had  told  her  he  might  be  kept  in- 
definitely at  that  infernal  job.  But  for  that  he  would  be 
fighting  now.  He  wanted  her  to  be  sorry  for  him;  and 
she  was  sorry  for  him.     And  she  was  glad  too. 

One  afternoon,  late  in  August,  she  had  come  home,  to 
sleep  till  dinner-time  between  her  day's  work  and  her 
night's  work,  when  she  found  him  upstairs  in  her  study. 
He  had  been  there  an  hour  waiting  for  her  by  himself. 
The  others  were  all  at  bandage  practice  in  the  school- 
room. 

"  I  hope  you  don't  mind,"  he  said.  "  Your  mother 
told  me  to  wait  up  here." 

She  had  come  in  straight  from  the  garage ;  there  was  a 
light  fur  of  dust  on  her  boots  and  on  the  shoulders  of  her 
tunic,  and  on  her  face  and  hair.  Her  hands  were  black 
with  oil  and  dirt  from  her  car. 

He  looked  at  her,  taking  it  all  in:  the  khaki  uniform 
(it  was  the  first  time  he  had  seen  her  in  it),  the  tunic, 
breeches  and  puttees,  the  loose  felt  hat  turned  up  at  one 
side,  its  funny,  boyish  chin-strap,  the  dust  and  dirt  of 
her;  and  he  smiled.  His  smile  had  none  of  the  cynical 
derision  which  had  once  greeted  her  appearances  as  a  mili- 
tant suffragist. 

"  And  yet,"  she  thought,  "  if  he's  consistent,  he  ought 
to  loathe  me  now." 

"  Dorothea.     Going  to  the  War,"  he  said. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  303 

"  Not  yet  —  worse  luck." 

"  Are  you  going  as  part  of  the  Canadian  contingent 
from  overseas,  or  what  ?  " 

"  I  wish  I  was.  Do  you  think  they'd  take  me  if  I 
cut  my  hair  oil?  " 

"  They  might.  They  might  do  anything.  This  is  a 
most  extraordinary  war." 

"  It's  a  war  that  makes  it  detestable  to  be  a  woman." 

"  I  thought "     Tor  a  moment  his  old  ungovernable 

devil  rose  in  him. 

"  What  did  you  think  ?  " 

"  No  matter.  That's  all  ancient  history.  I  say,  you 
look  like  business.  Do  you  really  mean  it?  Are  you 
really  going  to  Flanders  ?  " 

"  Do  you  suppose  any  woman  would  go  and  get  herself 
up  like  this  if  she  wasn't  going  somewhere  V 

He  said  (surprisingly),  "I  don't  see  what's  wrong 
with  it."  And  then :  "  It  makes  you  look  about  eight- 
een." 

"  That's  because  you  can't  see  my  face  for  the  dirt." 

"  For  the  chin-strap,  you  mean.  Dorothy  —  do  you 
realize  that  you're  not  eighteen?  You're  eight  and 
twenty." 

"  I  do,"  she  said.  "  But  I  rather  hoped  you  didn't ; 
or  that  if  you  did,  you  wouldn't  say  so." 

"  I  realize  that  I'm  thirty-eight,  and  that  between  us 
we've  made  a  pretty  mess  of  each  other's  lives." 

"  Have  I  made  a  mess  of  your  life  ? ' 

"  A  beastly  mess." 

"  I'm  sorry.  I  wouldn't  have  done  it  for  the  world 
if  I'd  known.     You  know  I  wouldn't. 


304  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  But  one  doesn't  know  things." 

"  One  doesn't  if  one's  Dorothea.  One  knows  some 
things  awfully  well;  but  not  the  things  that  matter." 

"  Well  —  but  what  could  I  do  ?  "  she  said. 

"  You  could  have  done  what  you  can  do  now.  You 
could  have  married  me.  And  we  would  have  had  three 
years  of  each  other." 

"  You  mean  three  centuries.  There  was  a  reason  why 
we  couldn't  manage  it." 

"  There  wasn't  a  reason.     There  isn't  any  reason  now. 

"  Look  here  —  to-day's  Wednesday.  Will  you  marry 
me  on  Friday  if  I  get  leave  and  a  licence  and  fix  it  up  to- 
morrow ?     We  shall  have  three  days." 

"  Three  days."  She  seemed  to  be  saying  to  herself 
that  for  three  days ]STo,  it  wasn't  worth  while. 

"  Well,  three  months  perhaps.  Perhaps  six,  if  my 
rotten  luck  doesn't  change.  Because,  I'm  doing  my  level 
best  to  make  it  change.  So,  you  see,  it's  got  to  be  one 
thing  or  another." 

And  still  she  seemed  to  be  considering:  Was  it  or 
was  it  not  worth  while  ? 

"  For  God's  sake  don't  say  you're  going  to  make  con- 
ditions. There  really  isn't  time  for  it.  You  can  think 
what  you  like  and  say  what  you  like  and  do  what  you 
like,  and  wear  anything  —  wear  a  busby  —  I  shan't  care 
if  you'll  only  marry  me." 

"  Yes.  That's  the  way  you  go  on.  And  yet  you  don't 
say  you  love  me.  You  never  have  said  it.  You  — 
you're  leaving  me  to  do  all  that." 

"  Why  —  what  else  have  I  been  doing  for  seven  years? 
Nine  years  —  ten  years  ?  " 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  305 

"Nothing.  Nothing  at  all.  You  just  seem  to  think 
that  I  can  go  off  and  get  married  to  a  man  without  know- 
ing whether  he  cares  for  me  or  not. 

"  And  now  it's  too  late.  My  hands  are  all  dirty. 
So's  my  face  —  filthy  —  you  mustn't  —  " 

"  I  don't  care.  They're  your  hands.  It's  your  face. 
I  don't  care." 

The  chin-strap,  the  absurd  chin-strap,  fretted  his 
mouth.  He  laughed.  He  said,  "  She  takes  her  hat  off 
when  she  goes  into  a  scrimmage,  and  she  keeps  it  on 
now  !  " 

She  loosened  the  strap,  laughing,  and  threw  her  hat, 
the  hat  of  a  Canadian  trooper,  on  to  the  floor.  His  mouth 
moved  over  her  face,  over  her  hair,  pressing  hard  into 
their  softness;  his  arms  clasped  her  shoulders;  they 
slipped  to  her  waist;  he  strained  her  slender  body  fast 
to  him,  straight  against  his  own  straightness,  till  the  pas- 
sion and  the  youth  she  had  denied  and  destroyed  shook 
her. 

He  said  to  himself,  "  She  shall  come  alive.  She  shall 
feel.  She  shall  want  me.  I'll  make  her.  I  should 
have  thought  of  this  ten  years  ago." 

Her  face  was  smooth;  it  smiled  under  the  touch  of  his 
mouth  and  hands.  And  fear  came  with  her  passion. 
She  thought,  "  Supposing  something  happens  before  Fri- 
day. If  I  could  only  give  myself  to  him  now  —  to- 
night." 

Then,  very  gently  and  very  tenderly,  he  released  her, 
as  if  he  knew  what  she  was  thinking.  He  was  sorry  for 
her  and  afraid.  Poor  Dorothy,  who  had  made  such  a 
beastly  mess  of  it,  who  had  come  alive  so  late. 


306  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

She  thought,  "  But  —  he  wouldn't  take  me  that  way. 
He'd  loathe  me  if  he  knew." 

Yet  surely  there  was  the  same  fear  in  his  eyes  as  he 
looked  at  her  ? 

They  were  sitting  beside  each  other  now,  talking 
quietly.  Her  face  and  hands  were  washed  clean;  as 
clean,  she  said,  as  they  ever  would  be. 

"  When  I  think,"  he  said,  "  of  the  years  we've  wasted. 
I  wonder  if  there  was  anything  that  could  have  pre- 
vented it." 

"  Only  your  saying  what  you've  said  now.  That  it 
didn't  matter  —  that  it  made  no  difference  to  you  what 
I  did.  But,  you  see,  it  made  all  the  difference.  And 
there  we  were." 

"It  didn't  — really." 

She  shook  her  head.      "  We  thought  it  did." 

"  No.  Do  you  remember  that  morning  I  fetched  you 
from  Holloway  ? 

"  Yes."  And  she  said  as  he  had  said  then,  "  I  don't 
want  to  talk  about  it.  I  don't  want  to  think  about  it  — 
except  that  it  was  dear  of  you." 

"  And  yet  it  was  from  that  morning  —  from  five-thirty 
a.  m.  —  that  we  seemed  to  go  wrong. 

"  There's  something  I  wanted  most  awfully  to  say,  if 
you  could  stand  going  back  to  it  for  just  one  second.  Do 
you  remember  saying  that  I  didn't  care  ?  That  I  never 
thought  of  you  when  you  were  in  prison  or  wondered 
what  you  were  feeling?  That's  what  put  me  off.  It 
hurt  so  atrociously  that  I  couldn't  say  anything. 

"  It   wasn't   true   that   I   didn't   think   about   you.     I 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  307 

thought  about  nothing  else  when  I  wasn't  working;  I 
nearly  went  off  my  head  with  thinking. 

"  And  you  said  I  didn't  listen  to  what  you  told  me. 
That  wasn't  true.     I  was  listening  like  anything." 

"  Darling  —  what  did  I  tell  you  ?  " 

"  Oh  —  about  the  thing  you  called  your  experience, 
or  your  adventure,  or  something." 

"  My  adventure  ?  " 

"  That's  what  you  called  it.  A  sort  of  dream  you  had 
in  prison.  I  couldn't  say  anything  because  I  was  stupid. 
It  was  beyond  me.     It's  beyond  me  now." 

"  Never  mind  my  adventure.     What  does  it  matter  ?  " 

"  It  matters  awfully.  Because  I  could  see  that  it 
meant  something  big  and  important  that  I  couldn't  get 
the  hang  of.  It  used  to  bother  me.  I  kept  on  trying 
to  get  it,  and  not  getting  it." 

"  You  poor  dear !  And  I've  forgotten  it.  It  did  feel 
frightfully  big  and  important  and  real  at  the  time.  And 
now  it's  as  if  it  had  happened  to  somebody  else  —  to 
Veronica  or  somebody  —  not  me." 

"  It  was  much  more  like  Veronica.  I  do  understand 
the  rest  of  that  business.  Now,  I  mean.  I  own  I  didn't 
at  the  time." 

"  It's  all  over,  Frank,  and  forgotten.  Swallowed  up  in 
the  War." 

"  You're  not  swallowed  up." 

"  Perhaps  I  shall  be." 

"  Well,  if  you  are  —  if  I  am  —  all  the  more  reason 
why  I  want  you  to  know  that  I  understand  what  you 
were  driving  at.  It  was  this  way,  wasn't  it  ?  You'd 
got   to  fight,   just  as   I've  got   to   fight.     You   couldn't 


308  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

keep  out  of  it  any  more  than  I  can  keep  out  of  this  War." 

"  You  couldn't  stay  out  just  for  me  any  more  than  I 
can  stay  out  for  just  you." 

"  And  in  a  sort  of  way  I'm  in  it  for  you.  And  in  a 
sort  of  way  you  were  in  it  —  in  that  damnable  suffrage 
business  —  for  me." 

"  How  clever  of  you,"  she  said,  "  to  see  it !  " 

"  I  didn't  see  it  then,"  he  said  simply,  "because  there 
wasn't  a  war  on.  "We've  both  had  to  pay  for  my  stu- 
pidity." 

"  And  mine.  And  my  cowardice.  I  ought  to  have 
trusted  you  to  see,  or  risked  it.  We  should  have  had 
three  —  no,  two  —  years." 

"  Well,  anyhow,  we've  got  this  evening." 

"  We  haven't.  I've  got  to  drive  Belgians  from  nine 
till  past  midnight." 

"  We've  got  Friday.  Suppose  they'll  give  me  leave  to 
get  married  in.  I  say  —  how  about  to-morrow  eve- 
ning? " 

"  I  can't.  Yes,  I  can.  At  least,  I  shall.  There's  a 
girl  I  know  who'll  drive  for  me.  They'll  have  to  give  me 
leave  to  get  married  in,  too." 

She  thought:  "I  can't  go  to  Flanders  now,  unless  he's 
sent  out.  If  he  is,  nothing  shall  stop  me  but  his  coming 
back  again." 

It  seemed  to  her  only  fair  and  fitting  that  they  should 
snatch  at  their  happiness  and  secure  it,  before  their  hour 
came. 

She  tried  to  turn  her  mind  from  the  fact  that  at  Mons 
the  British  line  was  being  pressed  back  and  back.  It 
would  recover.     Of  course  it  would  recover.     We  always 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  309 

began  like  that.     We  went  back  to  go  forwards  faster, 
when  we  got  into  our  stride. 

The  next  evening,  Thursday,  the  girl  she  knew  drove 
for  Dorothea. 

When  Frances  was  dressing  for  dinner  her  daughter 
came  to  her  with  two  frocks  over  her  arm. 

"  Mummy  ducky,"  she  said,  "  I  think  my  head's  go- 
ing. I  can't  tell  whether  to  wear  the  white  thing  or  the 
blue  thing.  And  I  feel  as  if  it  mattered  more  than  any- 
thing.    More  than  anything  on  earth." 

Frances  considered  it  —  Dorothea  in  her  uniform, 
and  the  white  frock  and  the  blue  frock. 

"  It  doesn't  matter  a  little  bit,"  she  said.  "  If  he 
could  propose  to  you  in  that  get-up " 

"  Can't  you  see  that  I  want  to  make  up  for  that  and 
for  all  the  things  he's  missed,  the  things  I  haven't  given 
him.  If  only  I  was  as  beautiful  as  you,  Mummy,  it 
wouldn't  matter." 

"  My  dear  —  my  dear " 

Dorothy  had  never  been  a  pathetic  child  —  not  half  so 
pathetic  as  Nicky  with  his  recklessness  and  his  earache 
—  but  this  grown-up  Dorothy  in  khaki  breeches,  with  her 
talk  about  white  frocks  and  blue  frocks,  made  Frances 
want  to  cry. 

Frank  was  late.  And  just  before  dinner  he  tele- 
phoned to  Dorothy  that  he  couldn't  be  with  her  before 
nine  and  that  he  would  only  have  one  hour  to  give  her. 

Frances  and  Anthony  looked  at  each  other.  But 
Dorothy  looked  at  Veronica, 


310  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  What's  the  matter,  Ronny  ?  You  look  simply  aw- 
ful." 

"  Do  I  ?  My  head's  splitting.  I  think  I'll  go  and  lie 
down." 

"  You'd  better." 

"  Go  straight  to  bed,"  said  Frances.  "  and  let  Nanna 
bring  you  some  hot  soup." 

But  Veronica  did  not  want  Nanna  and  hot  soup.  She 
only  wanted  to  take  herself  and  her  awful  look  away  out 
of  Dorothy's  sight. 

"  Well,"  said  Anthony,  "  if  she's  going  to  worry  her- 
self sick  about  Nicky  noiv " 

Frances  knew  that  she  was  not  worrying  about 
Nicky. 

It  was  nine  o'clock. 

At  any  minute  now  Frank  might  be  there.  Dorothy 
thought :  "  Supposing  he  hasn't  got  leave  %  "  But  she 
knew  that  was  not  likely.  If  he  hadn't  got  leave  he 
would  have  said  so  when  he  telephoned. 

The  hour  that  was  coming  had  the  colour  of  yesterday. 
He  would  hold  her  in  his  arms  again  till  she  trembled, 
and  then  he  would  be  afraid,  and  she  would  be  afraid, 
and  he  would  let  her  go. 

The  bell  rang,  the  garden  gate  swung  open;  his  feet 
were  loud  and  quick  on  the  flagged  path  of  the  terrace. 
He  came  into  the  room  to  them,  holding  himself  rather 
stiffly  and  very  upright.  His  eyes  shone  with  excite- 
ment. He  laughed  the  laugh  she  loved,  that  narrowed 
his  eyes  and  jerked  his  mouth  slightly  crooked. 

They  all  spoke  at  once.     "  You've  got  leave  ?  "     "  .He's 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  311 

got  it  all  right."  "  What  kept  you  ?  "  "  You  have  got 
leave  ? " 

His  eyes  still  shone;  his  mouth  still  jerked,  laughing. 

"Well,  no,"  he  said.  "That's  what  I  haven't  got. 
In  fact,  I'm  lucky  to  be  here  at  all." 

Nanna  came  in  with  the  coffee.  He  took  his  cup  from 
her  and  sat  down  on  the  sofa  beside  Frances,  stirring  his 
coffee  with  his  spoon,  and  smiling  as  if  at  something 
pleasant  that  he  knew,  something  that  he  would  tell  them 
presently  when  Nanna  left  the  room. 

The  door  closed  softly  behind  her.  He  seemed  to  be 
listening  intently  for  the  click  of  the  latch. 

"  Funny  chaps,"  he  said  meditatively.  "  They  keep 
putting  you  off  till  you  come  and  tell  them  you  want  to 
get  married  to-morrow.  Then  they  say  they're  sorry, 
but  your  marching  orders  are  fixed  for  that  day. 

"  Twelve  hours  isn't  much  notice  to  give  a  fellow." 

He  had  not  looked  at  Dorothy.  He  had  not  spoken  to 
her.  He  was  speaking  to  Anthony  and  John  and 
Frances  who  were  asking  questions  about  trains  and 
boats  and  his  kit  and  his  people.  He  looked  as  if  he  were 
not  conscious  of  Dorothy's  eyes  fixed  on  him  as  he  sat, 
slowly  stirring  his  coffee  without  drinking  it.  The  vi- 
bration of  her  nerves  made  his  answers  sound  muffled  and 
far-off. 

She  knew  that  her  hour  was  dwindling  slowly,  wast- 
ing, passing  from  her  minute  by  minute  as  they  talked. 
She  had  an  intolerable  longing  to  be  alone  with  him,  to 
be  taken  in  his  arms ;  to  feel  what  she  had  felt  yesterday. 
It  was  as  if  her  soul  stood  still  there,  in  yesterday,  and 
refused  to  move  on  into  to-day. 


312  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Yet  she  was  glad  of  their  talking.  It  put  off  the  end. 
When  they  stopped  talking  and  got  up  and  left  her  alone 
with  him,  that  would  be  the  end. 

Suddenly  he  looked  straight  at  her.  His  hands  trem- 
bled. The  cup  he  had  not  drunk  from  rattled  in  its 
saucer.  It  seemed  to  Dorothea  that  for  a  moment  the 
whole  room  was  hushed  to  listen  to  that  small  sound. 
She  saw  her  mother  take  the  cup  from  him  and  set  it  on 
the  table. 

One  by  one  they  got  up,  and  slunk  out  of  the  room,  as 
if  they  were  guilty,  and  left  her  alone  with  him. 

It  was  not  like  yesterday.  He  did  not  take  her  in  his 
arms.  He  sat  there,  looking  at  her  rather  anxiously, 
keeping  his  distance.  He  seemed  to  be  wondering  how 
she  was  going  to  take  it. 

He  thought :  "  I've  made  a  mess  of  it  again.  It 
wasn't  fair  to  make  her  want  me  —  when  I  might  have 
known.     I  ought  to  have  left  it." 

And  suddenly  her  soul  swung  round,  released  from 
yesterday. 

She  knew  what  he  had  wanted  yesterday:  that  her 
senses  should  be  ready  to  follow  where  her  heart  led.  But 
that  was  not  the  readiness  he  required  from  her  to-day; 
rather  it  was  what  his  anxious  eyes  implored  her  to  put 
away  from  her. 

There  was  something  more. 

He  wasn't  going  to  say  the  obvious  things,  the  "  Well, 
this  is  hard  luck  on  both  of  us.  You  must  be  brave. 
Don't  make  it  too  hard  for  me."  (She  could  have  made 
it  intolerable.)     It  wasn't  that.     He  knew  she  was  brave ; 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  313 

he  knew  she  wouldn't  make  it  hard  for  him;  he  knew  he 
hadn't  got  to  say  the  obvious  things. 

There  was  something  more ;  something  tremendous.  It 
came  to  her  with  the  power  and  sweetness  of  first  passion ; 
but  without  its  fear.  She  no  longer  wanted  him  to  take 
her  in  his  arms  and  hold  her  as  he  had  held  her  yesterday. 
Her  swinging  soul  was  steady;  it  vibrated  to  an  intenser 
rhythm. 

She  knew  nothing  now  but  that  what  she  saw  was  real, 
and  that  they  were  seeing  it  together.  It  was  Reality 
itself.  It  was  more  than  they.  When  realization  passed 
it  would  endure. 

Never  as  long  as  they  lived  would  they  be  able  to  speak 
of  it,  to  say  to  each  other  what  it  was  they  felt  and  saw. 

He  said,  "  I  shall  have  to  go  soon." 

And  she  said,  "  I  know.  Is  there  anything  I  can 
do?" 

"  I  wish  you'd  go  and  see  my  mother  some  time.  She'd 
like  it." 

"  I  should  love  to  go  and  see  her.     What  else  ?  " 

"  Well  —  I've  no  business  to  ask  you,  but  I  wish  you'd 
give  it  up." 

"  I'll  give  anything  up.     But  what  ?  " 

"  That  ambulance  of  yours  that's  going  to  get  into  the 
firing  line." 

"  Oh  —  " 

"  I  know  why  you  want  to  get  there.  You  want  to 
tackle  the  hardest  and  most  dangerous  job.  Naturally. 
But  it  won't  make  it  easier  for  us  to  win  the  War.  You 
can't  expect  us  to  fight  so  comfy,  and  to  be  killed  so  comfy, 


314  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

if  we  know  our  womenkind  are  being  pounded  to  bits  in 
the  ground  we've  just  cleared.  If  I  thought  you  were 
knocking  about  anywhere  there  —  " 

"  It  would  make  it  too  hard  ?  " 

"  It  would  make  me  jumpy.  The  chances  are  I 
shouldn't  have  much  time  to  think  about  it,  but  when  I 
did  —  " 

"  You'd  think  '  She  might  have  spared  me  that.'  " 

'  Yes.  And  you  might  think  of  your  people.  It's  bad 
enough  for  them,  Nicky  going." 

"  It  isn't  only  that  I'd  have  liked  to  be  where  you'll  be, 
and  where  he'll  be.     That  was  natural." 

"  It's  also  natural  that  we  should  like  to  find  you  here 
when  we  come  back." 

"  I  was  thinking  of  those  Belgian  women,  and  the 
babies  —  and  England ;  so  safe,  Frank ;  so  disgustingly 
safe." 

"  /  know.  Leaving  the  children  in  the  burning 
house  ?  " 

(She  had  said  that  once  and  he  had  remembered.) 

"  You  can  do  more  for  them  by  staying  in  Eng- 
land —  I'm  asking  you  to  take  the  hardest  job, 
really." 

"  It  isn't ;  if  it's  what  you  want  most." 

He  had  risen.  He  was  going.  His  hands  were  on  her 
shoulders,  and  they  were  still  discussing  it  as  if  it  were 
the  most  momentous  thing. 

"  Of  course,"  she  said,  "  I  won't  go  if  you  feel  like 
that  about  it.  I  want  you  to  fight  comfy.  You  mustn't 
worry  about  me." 

"  Xor  you  about  me.     I  shall  be  all  right.     Remember 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  315 

—  it's  your  War,  too  —  it's  the  biggest  fight  for  free- 
dom —  " 

"  I  know,"  she  said. 

And  then :     "  Have  you  got  all  your  things  %  " 

"  Somebody's  got  'em." 

"  I  haven't  given  you  anything.  You  must  have  my 
wrist-watch." 

She  unstrapped  the  leather  band  and  put  it  on  him. 

"  My  wrist's  a  whopper." 

"  So's  mine.  It'll  just  meet  —  at  the  last  hole.  It's 
phosphorous,"  she  said.  "  You  can  see  the  time  by  it  in 
the  dark." 

"  I've  nothing  for  you.  Except  —  "  he  fumbled  in  his 
pockets  — "  I  say  —  here's  the  wedding-ring." 

They  laughed. 

"  What  more  could  you  want  ?  "  she  said. 

He  put  it  on  her  finger;  she  raised  her  face  to  him 
and  he  stooped  and  kissed  her.  He  held  her  for  a  minute 
in  his  arms.     But  it  was  not  like  yesterday. 

Suddenly  his  face  stiffened.  "  Tell  them,"  he  said, 
"  that  I'm  going." 

The  British  were  retreating  from  Mons. 

The  German  attack  was  not  like  the  advance  of  an 
Army  but  like  the  travelling  of  an  earthquake,  the  burst- 
ing of  a  sea-wall.  There  was  no  end  to  the  grey  bat- 
talions, no  end  to  the  German  Army,  no  end  to  the  Ger^ 
man  people.  And  there  was  no  news  of  British  reinforce- 
ments, or  rumour  of  reinforcements. 

"  They  come  on  like  waves.  Like  waves,"  said  Doro- 
thea, reading  from  the  papers. 


316  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  I  wouldn't  read  about  it  if  I  were  you,  darling,"  said 
Frances. 

"  Why  not  ?  It  isn't  going  to  last  long.  "We'll  rally. 
See  if  we  don't." 

Dorothea's  clear,  hard  mind  had  gone  under  for  the 
time,  given  way  before  that  inconceivable  advance.  She 
didn't  believe  in  the  retreat  from  Mons.  It  couldn't  go 
on.     Reinforcements  had  been  sent. 

Of  course  they  had  been  sent.  If  Frank  was  ordered 
off  at  twelve  hours'  notice  that  meant  reinforcements,  or 
there  wouldn't  be  any  sense  in  it.  They  would  stop  the 
retreat.  We  were  sitting  here,  safe;  and  the  least  we 
could  do  for  them,  was  to  trust  them,  and  not  believe  any 
tales  of  their  retreating. 

And  all  the  time  she  wondered  how  news  of  him 
would  come.  By  wire?  By  letter?  By  telephone? 
She  was  glad  that  she  hadn't  got  to  wait  at  home,  listening 
for  the  clanging  of  the  garden  gate,  the  knock,  the  ringing 
of  the  bell. 

She  waited  five  days.  And  on  the  evening  of  the  sixth 
day  the  message  came  from  his  mother  to  her  mother: 
"  Tell  your  dear  child  for  me  that  my  son  was  killed  live 
days  ago,  in  the  retreat  from  Mons.  And  ask  her  to 
come  and  see  me;  but  not  just  yet." 

She  had  enclosed  copies  of  the  official  telegram;  and 
the  letter  from  his  Colonel. 

After  Mons,  the  siege  of  Antwerp.  The  refugees 
poured  into  Cannon  Street  Station. 

Dorothea  tried  hard  to  drown  her  grief  in  the  grief  of 
Belgium.     But  she  could  not  drown  it.     She  could  only 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  317 

poison  it  with  thoughts  that  turned  it  into  something  more 
terrible  than  grief.  They  came  to  her  regularly,  be- 
ginning after  midnight,  when  she  lay  in  bed  and  should 
have  slept,  worn  out  with  her  hard  day's  driving. 

She  thought :  "  I  could  bear  it  if  I  hadn't  wasted  the 
time  we  might  have  had  together.  All  those  years  — 
like  a  fool  —  over  that  silly  suffrage. 

"  I  could  bear  it  if  I  hadn't  been  cruel  to  him.  I 
talked  to  him  like  a  brute  and  an  idiot.  I  told  him  he 
didn't  care  for  freedom.  And  he's  died  for  it.  He  re- 
membered that.  It  was  one  of  the  last  things  he  remem- 
bered. He  said  '  It's  your  War  —  it's  the  biggest  fight 
for  freedom.'     And  he's  killed  in  it. 

"  I  could  bear  it  if  I'd  given  myself  to  him  that  night 
—  even  for  one  night. 

"  How  do  you  know  he'd  have  loathed  it  ?  I  ought  to 
have  risked  it.     I  was  a  coward.     He  got  nothing." 

His  persistent  image  in  her  memory  tortured  her.  It 
was  an  illusion  that  prolonged  her  sense  of  his  material 
presence,  urging  it  towards  a  contact  that  was  never 
reached.  Death  had  no  power  over  this  illusion.  She 
could  not  see  Drayton's  face,  dead  among  the  dead. 

Obsessed  by  her  illusion  she  had  lost  her  hold  on  the 
reality  that  they  had  seen  and  felt  together.  All  sense  of 
it  was  gone,  as  if  she  had  dreamed  it  or  made  it  up. 

Presently  she  would  not  have  her  work  to  keep  her 
from  thinking.  The  Ambulance  Corps  was  going  out  to 
Flanders  at  the  end  of  September,  and  it  would  take  her 
car  with  it  and  a  new  driver. 

Frances's  heart  ached  when  she  looked  at  her. 

"  If  I  could  only  help  you." 


318  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  You  can't,  Mummy  ducky,"  she  would  say.  And  she 
would  get  up  and  leave  the  room  where  Frances  was. 
Sometimes  she  would  go  to  Veronica;  but  more  often  she 
hid  away  somewhere  by  herself. 

Frances  thought :  "  She  is  out  of  my  reach.  I  can't 
get  at  her.  She'll  go  to  anybody  rather  than  to  me.  It 
used  to  be  Rosalind.     Now  it's  Veronica." 

But  Dorothy  could  not  speak  about  Drayton  to  her 
mother. 

Only  to  Veronica,  trying  to  comfort  her,  she  said,  "  I 
could  bear  it  if  he'd  been  killed  in  an  attack.  But  to  go 
straight,  like  that,  into  the  retreat.  He  couldn't  have  had 
five  hours'  fighting. 

"  And  to  be  killed  —  Retreating. 

"  He  got  nothing  out  of  it  but  agony." 

Veronica  said,  "  How  do  you  know  he  got  nothing  out 
of  it  ?  You  don't  know  what  he  may  have  got  in  the  last 
minute  of  it." 

"  Ronny,  I  don't  believe  I  should  mind  so  much  if  I 
were  going  out  to  Flanders  —  if  there  was  the  least  little 
chance  of  a  bullet  getting  me.  But  I  gave  him  my  word 
I  wouldn't  go. 

"  Do  you  think  I'm  bound  by  that  —  now  ?  " 

"  Now  ?  You're  more  bound  than  ever,  because  he's 
more  near  you,  more  alive." 

"  You  wouldn't  say  that  if  you  loved  him." 

One  day  a  package  came  to  her  from  Eltham.  Two 
notes  were  enclosed  with  it,  one  from  Drayton's  mother 
and  one  from  Drayton : 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  319 

"  Frank  said  I  was  to  send  you  this  if  he  was  killed. 
I  think  he  must  have  known  that  he  would  not  come 
back." 

"  My  d-eae  Dorothy, —  You  will  think  this  is  a  very 
singular  bequest.  But  I  want  you  to  see  that  my  memory 
is  fairly  good." 

The  very  singular  bequest  was  a  Bible,  with  three  ciga- 
rette-lighters for  markers,  and  a  date  on  the  fly-leaf: 
"  July  5th,  1912." 

The  cigarette-lighters  referred  her  to  Psalm  cxliv.,  and 
Isaiah  xxxv.  and  xl.,  and  pencil  marks  to  the  verses: 

"  Blessed  be  the  Lord  my  strength  which  teacheth  my 
hands  to  war  and  my  fingers  to  fight."  .  .  . 

"  And  an  highway  shall  be  there  .  .  .  the  redeemed 
shall  walk  there,  and  the  ransomed  of  the  Lord  shall  re- 
turn "... 

..."  They  that  wait  upon  the  Lord  shall  renew  their 
strength;  they  shall  mount  up  with  wings  as  eagles;  they 
shall  run  and  not  be  weary;  they  shall  walk  and  not 
faint." 

And  their  last  hour  came  back  to  her  with  its  mysteri- 
ous, sweet  and  powerful  passion  that  had  no  fear  in  it; 
and  she  laid  hold  again  on  the  Reality  they  had  seen  and 
felt  together. 

The  moment  passed.  She  wanted  it  to  come  back,  for 
as  long  as  it  lasted  she  was  at  peace. 

But  it  did  not  come  back.  Nothing  came  back  but 
her  anguish  of  remorse  for  all  that  she  had  wasted. 


XXI 

After  Drayton's  death  Frances  and  Anthony  were  so- 
bered and  had  ceased  to  feed  on  illusions.  The  Battle 
of  the  Marne  was  fought  in  vain  for  them.  They  did  not 
believe  that  it  had  saved  Paris. 

Then  came  the  fall  of  Antwerp  and  the  Great  Retreat. 
There  was  no  more  Belgium.  The  fall  of  Paris  and  the 
taking  of  Calais  were  only  a  question  of  time,  of  perhaps 
a  very  little  time.  Then  there  would  be  no  more  France. 
They  were  face  to  face  with  the  further  possibility  of 
there  being  no  more  England. 

In  those  months  of  September  and  October  Anthony 
and  Frances  were  changed  utterly  to  themselves  and  to 
each  other.  If,  before  the  War,  Frances  had  been  asked 
whether  she  loved  England,  she  would,  after  careful  con- 
sideration, have  replied  truthfully,  "  I  like  England. 
But  I  dislike  the  English  people.  They  are  narrow  and 
hypocritical  and  conceited.  They  are  snobbish;  and  I 
hate  snobs."  At  the  time  of  the  Boer  War,  beyond  think- 
ing that  the  British  ought  to  win,  and  that  they  would 
win,  and  feeling  a  little  spurt  as  of  personal  satisfaction 
when  they  did  win,  she  had  had  no  consciousness  of  her 
country  whatsoever.  As  for  loving  it,  she  loved  her  chil- 
dren and  her  husband,  and  she  had  a  sort  of  mild,  cat-like 
affection  for  her  garden  and  her  tree  of  Heaven  and  her 
house;  but  the  idea  of  loving  England  was  absurd;  you 
might  just  as  well  talk  of  loving  the  Archbishopric  of  Can- 

320 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  321 

terbury.  She  who  once  sat  in  peace  under  the  tree  of 
Heaven  with  her  Times  newspaper,  and  flicked  the  affairs 
of  the  nation  from  her  as  less  important  than  the  stitching 
on  her  baby's  frock,  now  talked  and  thought  and  dreamed 
of  nothing  else.  She  was  sad,  not  because  her  son  Nicho- 
las's time  of  safety  was  dwindling  week  by  week,  but  be- 
cause England  was  in  danger;  she  was  worried,  not  be- 
cause Lord  Kitchener  was  practically  asking  her  to  give 
up  her  son  Michael,  but  because  she  had  found  that  the 
race  was  to  the  swift  and  the  battle  to  the  strong,  and  that 
she  was  classed  with  her  incompetent  sisters  as  too  old  to 
wait  on  wounded  soldiers.  Every  morning  she  left  her 
household  to  old  Nanna's  care  and  went  down  to  the  City 
with  Anthony,  and  worked  till  evening  in  a  room  behind 
his  office,  receiving,  packing,  and  sending  off  great  cases 
of  food  and  clothing  to  the  Belgian  soldiers. 

Anthony  was  sad  and  worried,  not  because  he  had  three 
sons,  all  well  under  twenty-seven,  but  simply  and  solely 
because  the  Government  persisted  in  buying  the  wrong 
kind  of  timber  —  timber  that  swelled  and  shrank  again  — 
for  rifles  and  gun-carriages,  and  because  officials  wouldn't 
listen  to  him  when  he  tried  to  tell  them  what  he  knew 
about  timber,  and  because  the  head  of  a  department  had 
talked  to  him  about  private  firms  and  profiteering.  As  if 
any  man  with  three  sons  under  twenty-seven  would  want 
to  make  a  profit  out  of  the  War;  and  as  if  they  couldn't 
cut  down  everybody's  profits  if  they  took  the  trouble. 
They  might  cut  his  to  the  last  cent  so  long  as  we  had  gun- 
carriages  that  would  carry  guns  and  rifles  that  would 
shoot.  He  knew  what  he  was  talking  about  and  they 
didn't. 


322  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  Frances  said  he  was  right.  He  always  had  been 
right.  She  who  had  once  been  impatient  over  his  invari- 
able, irritating  Tightness,  loved  it  now.  She  thought  and 
said  that  if  there  were  a  few  men  like  Anthony  at  the 
head  of  departments  we  should  win  the  War.  We  were 
losing  it  for  want  of  precisely  that  specialized  knowledge 
and  that  power  of  organization  in  which  Anthony  excelled. 
She  was  proud  of  him,  not  because  he  was  her  husband 
and  the  father  of  her  children,  but  because  he  was  a  man 
who  could  help  England.  They  were  both  proud  of 
Michael  and  Nicholas  and  John,  not  because  they  were 
their  sons,  but  because  they  were  men  who  could  fight 
for  England. 

They  found  that  they  loved  England  with  a  secret, 
religious,  instinctive  love.  Two  feet  of  English  earth, 
the  ground  that  a  man  might  stand  and  fight  for,  became, 
mysteriously  and  magically,  dearer  to  them  than  their 
home.  They  loved  England  more  than  their  own  life  or 
the  lives  of  their  children.  Long  ago  they  had  realized 
that  fathers  do  not  beget  children  nor  mothers  bear  them 
merely  to  gratify  themselves.  Now,  in  September  and 
October,  they  were  realizing  that  children  are  not  begotten 
and  born  for  their  own  profit  and  pleasure  either. 

When  they  sat  together  after  the  day's  work  they  found 
themselves  saying  the  most  amazing  things  to  each  other. 

Anthony  said,  "  Downham  thinks  John's  heart  is  de- 
cidedly better.  I  shouldn't  wonder  if  he'd  have  to  go." 
Almost  as  if  the  idea  had  been  pleasant  to  him. 

And  Frances :  "  Well,  I  suppose  if  we  had  thirteen 
sons  instead  of  three,  we  ought  to  send  them  all." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  323 

"  Positively,"  said  Anthony.  "  I  believe  I'd  let 
Dorothy  go  out  now  if  she  insisted." 

"  Oh,  no,  I  think  we  might  be  allowed  to  keep 
Dorothy." 

She  pondered.  "  I  suppose  one  will  get  used  to  it  in 
time.  I  grudged  giving  Nicky  at  first.  I  don't  grudge 
him  now.  I  believe  if  he  went  out  to-morrow,  and  waa 
killed,  I  should  only  feel  how  splendid  it  was  of  him." 

"  I  wish  poor  Dorothy  could  feel  that  way  about  Dray- 
ton." 

"  She  does  —  really.  But  that's  different.  Frank 
had  to  go.  It  was  his  profession.  Nicky's  gone  in  of  his 
own  free  will." 

He  did  not  remind  her  that  Frank's  free  will  had 
counted  in  his  choice  of  a  profession. 

"  Once,"  said  Frances,  "  volunteers  didn't  count.  Now 
they  count  more  than  the  whole  Army  put  together." 

They  were  silent,  each  thinking  the  same  thing;  each 
knowing  that  sooner  or  later  they  must  speak  of  it. 

Frances  was  the  braver  of  the  two.     She  spoke  first. 

"  There's  Michael.  I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  him. 
He  doesn't  seem  to  want  to  go." 

That  was  the  vulnerable  place;  there  they  had  ached 
unbearably  in  secret.  It  was  no  use  trying  to  hide  it  any 
longer.     Something  must  be  done  about  Michael. 

"  I  wish  you'd  say  something  to  him,  Anthony." 

"  I  would  if  I  were  going  myself.     But  how  can  I  ?  " 

"  When  he  knows  that  you'd  have  gone  before  any  of 
them  if  you  were  young  enough." 

"  I  can't  say  anything.     You'll  have  to." 


324  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  No,  Anthony.  I  can't  ask  him  to  go  any  more  than 
you  can.  Nicky  is  the  only  one  of  us  who  has  any  right 
to." 

"  Or  Dorothy.  Dorothy'd  be  in  the  trenches  now  if  she 
had  her  way." 

"  I  can't  think  how  he  can  bear  to  look  at  Dorothy." 

But  in  the  end  she  did  say  something. 

She  went  to  him  in  his  room  upstairs  where  he  worked 
now,  hiding  himself  away  every  evening  out  of  their  sight. 
"  Almost,"  she  thought,  "  as  if  he  were  ashamed  of  him- 
self." 

Her  heart  ached  as  she  looked  at  him ;  at  the  fair,  seri- 
ous beauty  of  his  young  face;  at  the  thick  masses  of  his 
hair  that  would  not  stay  as  they  were  brushed  back,  but 
fell  over  his  forehead ;  it  was  still  yellow,  and  shining  as  it 
shone  when  he  was  a  little  boy. 

He  was  writing.  She  could  see  the  short,  irregular 
lines  of  verse  on  the  white  paper.  He  covered  them  with 
his  hand  as  she  came  in  lest  she  should  see  them.  That 
hurt  her. 

"  Michael,"  she  said,  "  I  wonder  if  you  ever  realize 
that  we  are  at  war." 

"  The  War  isn't  a  positive  obsession  to  me,  if  that's 
what  you  mean." 

"  It  isn't  what  I  mean.  Only  —  that  when  other  peo- 
ple are  doing  so  much  — 

"  George  Vereker  enlisted  yesterday." 

"  I  don't  care  what  other  people  are  doing.  I  never 
did.  If  George  Vereker  chooses  to  enlist  it  is  no  reason 
why  I  should." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  325 

"  My  darling  Mick,  I'm  not  so  sure.  Isn't  it  all  the 
more  reason,  when  so  much  more  has  been  done  for  you 
than  was  ever  done  for  him  ?  " 

"  It's  no  use  trying  to  get  at  me." 

"  England's  fighting  for  her  life,"  said  Frances. 

"  So's  Germany. 

"  You  see,  I  can't  feel  it  like  other  people.  George 
Vereker  hates  Germany;  I  don't.  I've  lived  there.  I 
don't  want  to  make  dear  old  Erau  Henschel  a  widow,  and 
stick  a  bayonet  into  Ludwig  and  Carl,  and  make  Hedwig 
and  Lottchen  cry." 

"  I  see.  You'd  rather  Carl  and  Ludwig  stuck  bayonets 
into  George  and  ISTicky,  and  that  Ronny  and  Dorothy  and 
Alice  Lathom  cried." 

"  Bayonetting  isn't  my  business." 

"  Your  own  safety  is.  How  can  you  bear  to  let  other 
men  fight  for  you  %  " 

"  They're  not  fighting  for  me,  Mother.  You  ask  them 
if  they  are,  and  see  what  they'll  say  to  you.  They're 
fighting  for  God  knows  what ;  but  they're  no  more  fighting 
for  me  than  they're  fighting  for  Aunt  Emmeline." 

"  They  are  fighting  for  Aunt  Emmeline.  They're 
fighting  for  everything  that's  weak  and  defenceless." 

"  Well,  then,  they're  not  fighting  for  me.  I'm  not 
weak  and  defenceless,"  said  Michael. 

"  All  the  more  shame  for  you,  then." 

He  smiled,  acknowledging  her  score. 

"  You  don't  mean  that,  really,  Mummy.  You  couldn't 
resist  the  opening  for  a  repartee.  It  was  quite  a  nice 
one." 


326  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  If,"  she  said,  "  you  were  only  doing  something.  But 
you  go  on  with  your  own  things  as  though  nothing  had 
happened." 

"  I  am  doing  something.  I'm  keeping  sane.  And  I'm 
keeping  sanity  alive  in  other  people." 

"  Much  you  care  for  other  people,"  said  Frances  as  she 
left  the  room. 

But  when  she  had  shut  the  door  on  him  her  heart 
turned  to  him  again.  She  went  down  to  Anthony  where 
he  waited  for  her  in  his  room. 

"  Well?"  he  said. 

"  It's  no  use.     He  won't  go." 

And  Frances,  quite  suddenly  and  to  her  own  surprise, 
burst  into  tears. 

He  drew  her  to  him,  and  she  clung  to  him,  sobbing 
softly. 

"  My  dear  —  my  dear.  You  mustn't  take  it  to  heart 
like  this.  He's  as  obstinate  as  the  devil;  but  he'll  come 
round." 

He  pressed  her  tighter  to  him.  He  loved  her  in  her 
unfamiliar  weakness,  crying  and  clinging  to  him. 

"  It's  not  that,"  she  said,  recovering  herself  with  dig- 
nity. "  I'm  glad  he  didn't  give  in.  If  he  went  out, 
and  anything  happened  to  him,  I  couldn't  bear  to  be  the 
one  who  made  him  go." 

After  all,  she  didn't  love  England  more  than  Michael. 

They  were  silent. 

"  We  must  leave  it  to  his  own  feeling,"  she  said  pres- 
ently. 

But  Anthony's  heart  was  hard  against  Michael. 

He    must    know    that    public    feeling's    pretty    strong 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  327 

against  him.     To  say  nothing  of  my  feeling  and  your 
feeling." 

He  did  know  it.  He  knew  that  they  were  all  against 
him;  his  father  and  his  mother,  and  John  and  Dorothy. 
Because  he  couldn't  bear  to  look  at  Dorothy,  and  couldn't 
bear  Dorothy  to  look  at  him,  he  kept  out  of  her  way  as 
much  as  possible. 

As  for  public  opinion,  it  had  always  been  against  him, 
and  he  against  it. 

But  Anthony  was  mistaken  when  he  thought  that  the 
pressure  of  these  antagonisms  would  move  Michael  an 
inch  from  the  way  he  meant  to  go.  Rather,  it  drew  out 
that  resistance  which  Michael's  mind  had  always  offered 
to  the  loathsome  violences  of  the  collective  soul.  From 
his  very  first  encounters  with  the  collective  soul  and  its 
emotions  they  had  seemed  to  Michael  as  dangerous  as  they 
were  loathsome.  Collective  emotion  might  be  on  the  side 
of  the  archangels  or  on  the  side  of  devils  and  of  swine ; 
its  mass  was  what  made  it  dangerous,  a  thing  that  chal- 
lenged the  resistance  of  the  private  soul.  But  in  his  worst 
dreams  of  what  it  could  do  to  him  Michael  had  never 
imagined  anything  more  appalling  than  the  collective  pa- 
triotism of  the  British  and  their  Allies,  this  rushing  to- 
gether of  the  souls  of  four  countries  to  make  one  mon- 
strous soul. 

And  neither  Anthony  nor  Frances  realized  that  Michael, 
at  this  moment,  was  afraid,  not  of  the  War  so  much  as 
of  the  emotions  of  the  War,  the  awful,  terrifying  flood 
that  carried  him  away  from  his  real  self  and  from  every- 
thing it  cared  for  most.     Patriotism  was,  no  doubt,  a  fine 


328  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

emotion ;  but  the  finer  the  thing  was,  the  more  it  got  you ; 
it  got  you  and  you  were  done  for.  He  was  determined 
that  it  shouldn't  get  him.  They  couldn't  see  —  and  that 
was  Michael's  grievance  —  that  his  resistance  was  his 
strength  and  not  his  weakness. 

Even  Trances,  who  believed  that  people  never  changed, 
did  not  realize  that  the  grown-up  Michael  who  didn't 
want  to  enlist  was  the  same  entity  as  the  little  Michael 
who  hadn't  wanted  to  go  to  the  party,  who  had  wanted 
to  go  on  playing  with  himself,  afraid  of  nothing  so  much 
as  of  forgetting  "  pieces  of  himself  that  he  wanted  to  re- 
member." He  was  Michael  who  refused  to  stay  at  school 
another  term,  and  who  talked  about  shooting  himself  be- 
cause he  had  to  go  with  his  class  and  do  what  the  other 
fellows  were  doing.  He  objected  to  being  suddenly  re: 
quired  to  feel  patriotic  because  other  people  were  feeling 
patriotic,  to  think  that  Germany  was  in  the  wrong  because 
other  people  thought  that  Germany  was  in  the  wrong, 
to  fight  because  other  people  were  fighting. 

Why  should  he?     He  saw  no  earthly  reason  why. 

He  said  to  himself  that  it  was  the  blasted  cheek  of  the 
assumption  that  he  resented.  There  was  a  peculiarly 
British  hypocrisy  and  unfairness  and  tyranny  about  it 
all. 

It  wasn't  —  as  they  all  seemed  to  think  —  that  he  was 
afraid  to  fight.  He  had  wanted  to  go  and  fight  for  Ire- 
land. He  would  fight  any  day  in  a  cleaner  cause.  By  a 
cleaner  cause  Michael  meant  a  cause  that  had  not  been 
messed  about  so  much  by  other  people.  Other  people  had 
not  put  pressure  on  him  to  fight  for  Ireland;  in  fact  they 
had  tried  to  stop  him.     Michael  was  also  aware  that  in 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  329 

the  matter  of  Ireland  his  emotions,  though  shared  by  con- 
siderable numbers  of  the  Irish  people,  were  not  shared  by 
his  family  or  by  many  people  whom  he  knew;  to  all  in- 
tents and  purposes  he  had  them  to  himself. 

It  was  no  use  trying  to  explain  all  this  to  his  father 
and  mother,  for  they  wouldn't  understand  it.  The  more 
he  explained  the  more  he  would  seem  to  them  to  be  a 
shirker. 

He  could  see  what  they  thought  of  him.  He  saw  it  in 
their  stiff,  reticent  faces,  in  his  mother's  strained  smile, 
in  his  sister's  silence  when  he  asked  her  what  she  had 
been  doing  all  day.  Their  eyes  —  his  mother's  and  his 
sister's  eyes  —  pursued  him  with  the  unspoken  question: 
"  Why  don't  you  go  and  get  killed  —  for  England  —  like 
other  people  ?  " 

Still,  he  could  bear  these  things,  for  they  were  visible, 
palpable;  he  knew  where  he  was  with  them.  What  he 
could  not  stand  was  that  empty  spiritual  space  between 
him  and  Nicky.  That  hurt  him  where  he  was  most  vul- 
nerable —  in  his  imagination. 

And  again,  his  imagination  healed  the  wound  it  made. 

It  was  all  very  well,  but  if  you  happened  to  have  a  re- 
ligion, and  your  religion  was  what  mattered  to  you  most; 
if  you  adored  Beauty  as  the  supreme  form  of  Life ;  if  you 
cared  for  nothing  else ;  if  you  lived,  impersonally,  to  make 
Beauty  and  to  keep  it  alive,  and  for  no  other  end,  how 
could  you  consent  to  take  part  in  this  bloody  business  ? 
That  would  be  the  last  betrayal,  the  most  cowardly  sur- 
render. 

And  you  were  all  the  more  bound  to  faithfulness  if  you 


330  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

were  one  of  the  leaders  of  a  forlorn  hope,  of  the  forlorn 
hope  of  all  the  world,  of  all  the  ages,  the  forlorn  hope  of 
God  himself. 

For  Michael,  even  more  than  Ellis,  had  given  himself 
up  as  lost. 

And  yet  somehow  they  all  felt  curiously  braced  by  the 
prospect.  When  the  young  men  met  in  Lawrence 
Stephen's  house  they  discussed  it  with  a  calm,  high  hero- 
ism. This  was  the  supreme  test :  To  go  on,  without  pay, 
without  praise,  without  any  sort  of  recognition.  Any 
fool  could  fight ;  but,  if  you  were  an  artist,  your  honour 
bound  you  to  ignore  the  material  contest,  to  refuse,  even 
to  your  country,  the  surrender  of  the  highest  that  you 
knew.  They  believed  with  the  utmost  fervour  and  sin- 
cerity that  they  defied  Germany  more  effectually,  because 
more  spiritually,  by  going  on  and  producing  fine  things 
with  imperturbability  than  if  they  went  out  against  the 
German  Armies  with  bayonets  and  machine-guns.  More- 
over they  were  restoring  Beauty  as  fast  as  Germany  de- 
stroyed it. 

They  told  each  other  these  things  very  seriously  and 
earnestly,  on  Friday  evenings  as  they  lay  about  more  or 
less  at  their  ease  (but  rather  less  than  more)  in  Stephen's 
study. 

They  had  asked  each  other :  "  Are  you  going  to  fight 
for  your  country  ?  " 

And  EIH9  had  said  he  was  damned  if  he'd  fight  for  his 
country;  and  Michael  had  said  he  hadn't  got  a  country, 
so  there  was  no  point  in  his  fighting,  anyhow;  and  Monier- 
Owen  that  if  you  could  ahcw  him  a  country  that  cared. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  331 

for  the  arts  before  anything  he'd  fight  for  it;  but  that 
England  was  very  far  from  being  that  country. 

And  Michael  had  sat  silent,  thinking  the  same  thoughts. 

And  Stephen  had  sat  silent,  thinking  other  thoughts, 
not  listening  to  what  was  said. 

And  now  people  were  whining  about  Louvain  and 
Rheims  Cathedral.  Michael  said  to  himself  that  he  could 
stand  these  massed  war  emotions  if  they  were  sincere ;  but 
people  whined  about  Louvain  and  Rheims  Cathedral  who 
had  never  cared  a  damn  about  either  before  the  War. 

Anthony  looked  up  over  the  edge  of  his  morning  paper, 
inquired  whether  Michael  could  defend  the  destruction  of 
Louvain  and  Rheims  Cathedral? 

Michael  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  Why  bother,"  he 
said,  "  about  Rheims  Cathedral  and  Louvain  ?  From 
your  point  of  view  it's  all  right.  If  Louvain  and  Rheims 
Cathedral  get  in  the  way  of  the  enemy's  artillery  they've 
got  to  go.  They  didn't  happen  to  be  in  the  way  of  ours, 
that's  all." 

Michael's  mind  was  showing  certain  symptoms,  signifi- 
cant of  its  malady.  He  was  inclined  to  disparage  the 
military  achievements  of  the  Allies  and  to  justify  the  acts 
of  Germany. 

"  It's  up  to  the  French  to  defend  Paris.  And  what 
have  we  got  to  do  with  Alsace-Lorraine  ?  As  if  every  in- 
teligent  Frenchman  didn't  know  that  Alsace-Lorraine  is 
a  sentimental  stunt.  No.  I'm  not  pro-German.  I 
simply  see  things  as  they  are." 

"  I  think,"  Frances  would  say  placably,  "  we'd  better 
not  talk  about  the  War." 


332  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

He  would  remind  them  that  it  was  not  his  subject. 

And  John  laughed  at  him.  "  Poor  old  Nick  hates  the 
War  because  it's  dished  him.  He  knows  his  poems  can't 
come  out  till  it's  over." 

As  it  happened,  his  poems  came  out  that  autumn. 

After  all,  the  Germans  had  been  held  back  from 
Paris.  As  Stephen  pointed  out  to  him,  the  Battle  of  the 
Marne  had  saved  Michael.  In  magnificent  defiance  of 
the  enemy,  the  "  New  Poems  "  of  Michael  Harrison,  with 
illustrations  by  Austin  Mitchell,  were  announced  as  forth- 
coming in  October ;  and  Morton  Ellis's  "  Eccentricities," 
with  illustrations  by  Austin  Mitchell,  were  to  appear  the 
same  month.  Even  Wadham's  poems  would  come  out 
some  time,  perhaps  next  spring. 

Stephen  said  the  advertisements  should  be  offered  to 
the  War  Office  as  posters,  to  strike  terror  into  Germany 
and  sustain  the  morale  of  the  Allied  Armies.  "  If  Eng- 
land could  afford  to  publish  Michael " 

Michael's  family  made  no  comment  on  the  appearance 
of  his  poems.  The»book  lay  about  in  the  same  place  on  the 
drawing-room  table  for  weeks.  When  Nanna  dusted  she 
replaced  it  with  religious  care ;  none  of  his  people  had  so 
much  as  taken  it  up  to  glance  .inside  it,  or  hold  it  in  their 
hands.  It  seemed  to  Michael  that  they  were  conscious 
of  it  all  the  time,  and  that  they  turned  their  faces  away 
from  it  pointedly.  They  hated  it.  They  hated  him  for 
having  written  it. 

He  remembered  that  it  had  been  different  when  his 
first  book  had  come  out  two  years  ago.  They  had  read 
that ;  they  had  snatched  at  all  the  reviews  of  it  and  read 
it  again,  trying  to  see  what  it  was  that  they  had  missed. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  333 

They  had  taken  each  other  aside,  and  it  had  been: 
"  Anthony,  do  you  understand  Michael's  poems  ?  " 
"  Dorothy,     do    you    understand    Michael's    poems  %  " 
"  Nicky,  do  you  understand  Michael's  poems  \  " 
He  remembered  his  mother's  apology  for  not  under- 
standing them :     "  Darling,   I  do  see  that  they're  very 
beautiful."     He    remembered   how   he   had   wished  that 
they  would  give  up  the  struggle  and  leave  his  poems  alone. 
They  were  not  written  for  them.     He  had  been  amused 
and  irritated  when  he  had  seen  his  father  holding  the  book 
doggedly  in  front  of  him,  his  poor  old  hands  twitching 
with   embarrassment  whenever  he  thought   Michael  was 
looking  at  him. 

And  now  he,  who  had  been  so  indifferent  and  so  con- 
temptuous, was  sensitive  to  the  least  quiver  of  his  mother's 
upper  lip. 

Veronica's  were  the  only  eyes  that  were  kind  to  him; 
that  did  not  hunt  him  down  with  implacable  suggestion 
and  reminder. 

Veronica  had  been  rejected  too.  She  was  not  strong 
enough  to  nurse  in  the  hospitals.  She  was  only  strong 
enough  to  work  from  morning  to  night,  packing  and  car- 
rying large,  heavy  parcels  for  the  Belgian  soldiers.  She 
wanted  Michael  to  be  sorry  for  her  because  she  couldn't 
be  a  nurse.  Rosalind  Jervis  was  a  nurse.  But  he  was 
not  sorry.  He  said  he  would  very  much  rather  she  didn't 
do  anything  that  Rosalind  did. 

"  So  would  Nicky,"  he  said. 

And  then :  "  Veronica,  do  yon  think  I  ought  to  en- 
list?" 


334  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

The  thought  was  beginning  to  obsess  him. 

"  Xo,"  she  said;  "  you're  different. 

"  I  know  how  you  feel  about  it.  Nicky's  heart  and 
soul  are  in  the  War.  If  he's  killed  it  can  only  kill  his 
body.     Your  soul  isn't  in  it.     It  would  kill  your  soul." 

"  It's  killing  it  now,  killing  everything  I  care  for." 

"  Killing  everything  we  all  care  for,  except  the  things 
it  can't  kill." 

That  was  one  Sunday  evening  in  October.  They  were 
standing  together  on  the  long  terrace  under  the  house 
wall.  Before  them,  a  little  to  the  right,  on  the  edge  of 
the  lawn,  the  great  ash-tree  rose  over  the  garden.  The 
curved  and  dipping  branches  swayed  and  swung  in  a  low 
wind  that  moved  like  quiet  water. 

"  Michael,"  she  said,  "  do  look  what's  happening  to  that 
tree." 

"  I  see,"  he  said. 

It  made  him  sad  to  look  at  the  tree ;  it  made  him  sad  to 
look  at  Veronica  —  because  both  the  tree  and  Veronica 
were  beautiful. 

"  When  I  was  a  little  girl  I  used  to  sit  and  look  and 
look  at  that  tree  till  it  changed  and  got  all  thin  and  queer 
and  began  to  move  towards  me. 

"  I  never  knew  whether  it  had  really  happened  or  not ; 
I  don't  know  now  —  or  whether  it  was  the  tree  or  me. 
It  was  as  if  by  looking  and  looking  you  could  make  the 
tree  more  real  and  more  alive." 

Michael  remembered  something. 

"  Dorothy  says  you  saw  Ferdie  the  night  he  died." 

"  So  I  did.  But  that's  not  the  same  thing.  I  didn't 
have  to  look  and  look.     I  just  saw  him.     I  sort  of  saw 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  335 

Frank  that  last  night  —  when  the  call  came  —  only  sort 
of  —  but  I  knew  he  was  going  to  be  killed. 

"  I  didn't  see  him  nearly  so  distinctly  as  I  saw 
Nicky " 

"  Nicky  ?     You  didn't  see  him  —  as  you  saw  Ferdie  ?  " 

"  No,  no,  no !  It  was  ages  ago  —  in  Germany  — 
before  he  married.     I  saw  him  with  Desmond." 

"  Have  you  ever  seen  me  ?  " 

"  Not  yet.  That's  because  you  don't  want  me  as  they 
did." 

"  Don't  I !     Don't  I !  " 

And  she  said  again:     "  Not  yet." 

Nicky  had  had  leave  for  Christmas.  He  had  come  and 
gone. 

Frances  and  Anthony  were  depressed ;  they  were  begin- 
ning to  be  frightened. 

For  Nicky  had  finished  his  training.  He  might  be 
sent  out  any  day. 

Nicky  had  had  some  moments  of  depression.  Nothing 
had  been  heard  of  the  Moving  Fortress.  Again,  the  War 
Office  had  given  no  sign  of  having  received  it.  It  was 
hard  luck,  he  said,  on  Drayton. 

And  John  was  depressed  after  he  had  gone. 

"  They'd  much  better  have  taken  me,"  he  said. 
"  What's  the  good  of  sending  the  best  brains  in  the  Army 
to  get  pounded  ?  There's  Drayton.  He  ought  to  have 
been  in  the  Ordnance.     .He's  killed. 

"  And  here's  Nicky.  Nicky  ought  to  be  in  the  engin- 
eers or  the  gunners  or  the  Royal  Flying  Corps ;  but  he's 
got  to  stand  in  the  trenches  and  be  pounded. 


336  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Lot  they  care  about  anybody's  brains.  Drayton 
could  have  told  Kitchener  that  we  can't  win  this  war  with- 
out high-explosive  shells.     So  could  Kicky. 

"  You  bet  they've  stuck  all  those  plans  and  models  in 
the  sanitary  dust-bin  behind  the  War  Office  back  door. 
It's  enough  to  make  Nicky  blow  his  brains  out." 

"  Nicky  doesn't  care,  really,"  Veronica  said.  "  He  just 
leaves  things  —  and  goes  on." 

That  night,  after  the  others  had  gone  to  bed,  Michael 
stayed  behind  with  his  father. 

"  It  must  look  to  you,"  he  said,  "  as  if  I  ought  to  have 
gone  instead  of  Nicky." 

"  I  don't  say  so,  Michael.  And  I'm  sure  Nicky 
wouldn't." 

"  No,  but  you  both  think  it.  You  see,  if  I  went  1 
shouldn't  be  any  good  at  it.  Not  the  same  good  as  Nicky. 
He  wants  to  go  and  I  don't.  Can't  you  see  it's  dif- 
ferent ?  " 

"  Yes,"  said  Anthony,  "  I  see.  I've  seen  it  for  some 
time." 

And  Michael  remembered  the  night  in  August  when  his 
brother  came  to  him  in  his  room. 

Beauty  —  the  Forlorn  Hope  of  God  —  if  he  cared  for 
it  supremely,  why  was  he  pursued  and  tormented  by  the 
thought  of  the  space  between  him  and  Nicky? 


XXII 

Michael  had  gone  to  Stephen's  house. 

He  was  no  longer  at  his  ease  there.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  Lawrence's  eyes  followed  him  too;  not  with  hatred, 
hut  with  a  curious  meditative  wonder. 

To-night  Stephen  said  to  him,  "  Did  you  know  that  Re- 
veillaud's  killed?" 

"  Killed  ?  Killed  ?  I  didn't  even  know  he  was  fight- 
ing." 

Lawrence  laughed.  "  What  did  you  suppose  he  was 
doing  ?  " 

"  No  —  but  how?" 

"  Out  with  the  patrol  and  shot  down.  There  you 
arc " 

He  shoved  the  Times  to  him,  pointing  to  the  extract 
from  Le  Matin:  "  It  is  with  regret  that  we  record  the 
death  of  M.  Jules  Reveillaud,  the  brilliant  young  poet 
and  critic " 

Michael  stared  at  the  first  three  lines;  something  in  his 

j  mind  prevented  him  from  going  on  to  the  rest,  as  if  he  did 

not  care  to  read  about  Reveillaud  and  know  how  he  died. 

"  It  is  with  regret  that  we  record  the  death.  It  is  with 
regret  that  we  record  —  with  regret " 

Then  he  read  on,  slowly  and  carefully,  to  the  end.  It 
was  a  long  paragraph. 

337 


338  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  To  think,"  he  said  at  last,  "  that  this  revolting  thing 
should  have  happened  to  him." 

"His  death?" 

"  No  —  this.  The  Matin  never  mentioned  Reveillaud 
before.  None  of  the  big  papers,  none  of  the  big  reviews 
noticed  his  existence  except  to  sneer  at  him.  He  goes  out 
and  gets  killed  like  any  little  bourgeois,  and  the  swine 
plaster  him  all  over  with  their  filthy  praise.  He'd  rather 
they'd  spat  on  him." 

He  meditated  fiercely.  "  Well  —  he  couldn't  help  it. 
He  was  conscripted." 

"  You  think  he  wouldn't  have  gone  of  his  own  accord  ?  " 

"  I'm  certain  he  wouldn't." 

"  And  I'm  certain  he  would." 

"  I  wish  to  God  we'd  got  conscription  here.  I'd  rather 
the  Government  commandeered  my  body  than  stand  this 
everlasting  interference  with  my  soul." 

"  Then,"  said  Lawrence,  "  you'll  not  be  surprised  at 
my  enlisting." 

"  You're  not " 

"  I  am.  I'd  have  been  in  the  first  week  if  I'd  known 
what  to  do  about  Vera." 

"  But  —  it's  —  it's  not  sane." 

"  Perhaps  not.     But  it's  Irish." 

"  Irish  ?  I  can  understand  ordinary  Irishmen  rush- 
ing into  a  European  row  for  the  row's  sake,  just  because 
they  haven't  got  a  civil  war  to  mess  about  in.  But  you 
—  of  all  Irishmen  —  why  on  earth  should  you  be  in  it  ?  " 

"  Because  I  want  to  be  in  it." 

"  I  thought,"  said  Michael,  "  you  were  to  have  been  a 
thorn  in  England's  side  ?  " 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  339 

"  So  I  was.  So  I  am.  But  not  at  this  minute.  My 
grandmother  was  a  hard  Ulster  woman  and  I  hated  her. 
But  I  wouldn't  be  a  thorn  in  my  grandmother's  side  if 
the  old  lady  was  assaulted  by  a  brutal  voluptuary,  and  I 
saw  her  down  and  fighting  for  her  honour. 

"  I've  been  a  thorn  in  England's  side  all  my  life.  But 
it's  nothing  to  the  thorn  I'll  be  if  I'm  killed  fighting  for 
her." 

"  Why  —  why  —  if  you  want  to  fight  in  the  civil  war 
afterwards  ?  " 

"  Why  ?  Because  I'm  one  of  the  few  Irishmen  who 
can  reason  straight.  I  was  going  into  the  civil  war  last 
year  because  it  was  a  fight  for  freedom.  I'm  going  into 
this  War  this  year  because  it's  a  bigger  fight  for  a  bigger 
freedom. 

"  You  can't  have  a  free  Ireland  without  a  free  Eng- 
land, any  more  than  you  can  have  religious  liberty  with- 
out political  liberty.  If  the  Orangemen  understood  any- 
thing at  all  about  it  they'd  see  it  was  the  Nationalists  and 
the  Sinn  Feiners  that'll  help  them  to  put  down  Catholi- 
cism in  Ireland." 

'  You  think  it  matters  to  Ireland  whether  Germany 
licks  us  or  we  lick  Germany  ?  " 

"  I  think  it  matters  to  the  whole  world." 

"  What's  changed  you  ?  "  said  Michael. 

He  was  angry  with  Lawrence.  He  thought :  "  He 
hasn't  any  excuse  for  failing  us.  He  hasn't  been  con- 
scripted." 

"  Xothing's  changed  me.  But  supposing  it  didn't  mat- 
ter to  the  whole  world,  or  even  to  Europe,  and  supposing 
the  Allies  were  beaten  in  the  end,  you  and  I  shouldn't 


340  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

be  beaten,  once  we'd  stripped  ourselves,  stripped  our  souls 
clean,  and  gone  in. 

"  Victory,  Michael  —  victory  is  a  state  of  mind." 

The  opportunist  had  seen  his  supreme  opportunity. 

He  would  have  snatched  at  it  in  the  first  week  of  the 
War,  as  he  had  said,  but  that  Vera  had  made  it  hard  for 
him.  She  was  not  making  it  easy  now.  The  dull,  dark 
moth's  wings  of  her  eyes  hovered  about  him,  fluttering 
with  anxiety. 

"When  she  heard  that  he  was  going  to  enlist  she  sent  for 
Veronica. 

Veronica  said,  "  You  must  let  him  go." 

"  I  can't  let  him  go.  And  why  should  I  ?  He'll  do  no 
good.     He's  over  age.     He's  no  more  fit  than  I  am." 

"  You'll  have  to,  sooner  or  later." 

"  Later,  then.  jSTot  one  minute  before  I  must.  If  they 
want  him  let  them  come  and  take  him." 

"  It  won't  hurt  so  much  if  you  let  him  go,  gently,  now. 
He'll  tear  at  you  if  you  keep  him." 

"  He  has  torn  at  me.  He  tears  at  me  every  day.  I 
don't  mind  his  tearing.  I  mind  his  going  —  going  and 
getting  killed,  wounded,  paralysed,  broken  to  pieces." 

"  You'll  mind  his  hating  you.  You'll  mind  that  aw- 
fully." 

"  I  shan't.  He's  hated  me  before.  He  went  away 
and  left  me  once.  But  he  came  back.  He  can't  really 
do  without  me." 

"You  don't  know  how  he'll  hate  you  if  you  come  be- 
tween him  and  what  he  wants  most." 

"  I  used  to  be  what  he  wanted  most." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  341 

"  Well  —  it's  his  honour  now." 

"  That's  what  they  all  say,  Michael  and  Anthony,  and 
Dorothy.  They're  men  and  they  don't  know.  Dorothy's 
more  a  man  than  a  woman. 

"  But  you're  different.  I  thought  you  might  help  me 
to  keep  him  —  they  say  you've  got  some  tremendous 
secret.     And  this  is  the  way  you  go  on !  " 

"  I  wouldn't  help  you  to  keep  him  if  I  could.  I 
wouldn't  have  kept  Nicky  for  all  the  world.  Aunt 
Frances  wouldn't  have  kept  him.  She  wants  Michael 
to  go." 

"  She  doesn't.  If  she  says  she  does  she  lies.  All  the 
women  are  lying.  Either  they  don't  care  —  they're  just 
lumps,  with  no  hearts  and  no  nerves  in  them  —  or  they 
lie. 

"  It's  this  rotten  pose  of  patriotism.  They  get  it  from 
each  other,  like  —  like  a  skin  disease.  No  wonder  it 
makes  Michael  sick." 

"  Men  going  out  —  thousands  and  thousands  and  thou- 
sands —  to  be  cut  about  and  blown  to  bits,  and  their 
women  safe  at  home,  snuffling  and  sentimentalizing  — 

"  Lying  —  lying  —  lying." 

"  Who  wouldn't  ?  Who  wouldn't  tell  one  big,  thump- 
ing, sacred  lie,  if  it  sends  them  off  happy  ?  " 

"  But  we're  not  lying.  It's  the  most  real  thing  that 
ever  happened  to  us.  I'm  glad  Nicky's  going.  I  shall 
be  glad  all  my  life." 

"  It  comes  easy  to  you.  You're  a  child.  You've  never 
grown  up.  You  were  a  miserable  little  mummy  when 
you  were  born.  And  now  you  look  as  if  every  drop  of 
blood  was  drained  out  of  your  body  in  your  teens.     If 


342  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

that's  your  tremendous  secret  you  can  keep  it  yourself. 
It  seems  to  be  all  you've  got." 

"  If  it  wasn't  for  Aunt  Frances  and  Uncle  Anthony  it 
would  have  been  all  I've  got." 

Vera  looked  at  her  daughter  and  saw  her  for  the  first 
time  as  she  really  was.  The  child  was  not  a  child  any 
more.  She  was  a  woman,  astonishingly  and  dangerously 
mature.  Veronica's  sorrowful,  lucid  eyes  took  her  in ; 
they  neither  weighed  her  nor  measured  her,  but  judged 
her,  off-hand  with  perfect  accuracy. 

"  Poor  little  Eonny.  I've  been  a  beastly  mother  to 
you.  Still,  you  can  thank  my  beastliness  for  Aunt 
Frances  and  Uncle  Anthony." 

Veronica  thought :  "  How  funny  she  is  about  it !  " 
She  said,  "  It's  your  beastliness  to  poor  Larry  that  I  mind. 
You  know  what  you're  keeping  him  for." 

She  knew;  and  Lawrence  knew. 

That  night  he  told  her  that  if  he  hadn't  wanted  to  en- 
list he'd  be  driven  to  it  to  get  away  from  her. 

And  she  was  frightened  and  held  her  tongue. 

Then  she  got  desperate.  She  did  things.  She  in- 
trigued behind  his  back  to  keep  him;  and  he  found  her 
out. 

He  came  to  her,  furious. 

"  You  needn't  lie  about  it,"  he  said.  "  I  know  what 
you've  done.  You've  been  writing  letters  and  getting  at 
people.  You've  told  the  truth  about  my  age  and  you've 
lied  about  my  health.  You've  even  gone  round  cadging 
for  jobs  for  me  in  the  Red  Cross  and  the  Press  Bureau 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  343 

and  the  Intelligence  Department,  and  God  only  knows 
whether  I'm  supposed  to  have  put  you  up  to  it." 

"  I  took  care  of  that,  Larry." 

"  You  ?     You'd  no  right  to  interfere  with  my  affairs." 

"  Hadn't  I  %     Not  after  living  with  you  seven  years  ?  " 

"  If  you'd  lived  with  me  seven  centuries  you'd  have 
had  no  right  to  try  to  keep  a  man  back  from  the  Army." 

"  I'm  trying  to  keep  a  man's  brain  for  my  country." 

"  You  lie.  It's  my  body  you're  trying  to  keep  for 
yourself.     As  you  did  when  I  was  going  to  Ireland." 

"  Oh,  then  —  I  tried  to  stop  you  from  being  a  traitor 
to  England.  They'd  have  hanged  you,  my  dear,  for 
that." 

"  Traitor  ?  It's  women  like  you  that  are  the  traitors. 
My  God,  if  there  was  a  Government  in  this  country  that 
could  govern,  you'd  be  strung  up  in  a  row,  all  of  you,  and 
hanged." 

"  No  wonder  you  think  you're  cut  out  for  a  soldier. 
You're  cruel  enough." 

"  Fow're  cruel.  I'd  rather  be  hanged  than  live  with 
you  a  day  longer  after  what  you've  done.  A  Frenchman 
shot  his  wife  the  other  day  for  less  than  that." 

"  What  was  '  less  than  that '  ?"  she  said. 

"  She  crawled  after  him  to  the  camp,  like  a  bitch. 

"  He  sent  her  away  and  she  came  again  and  again.  He 
had  to  shoot  her." 

"  "Was  there  nothing  to  be  said  for  her  ?  " 

"  There  was.  She  knew  it  was  a  big  risk  and  she  took 
it.  You  knew  you  were  safe  while  you  slimed  my  hon- 
our." 


344  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  She  loved  him,  and  he  shot  her,  and  you  think  that's 
a  fine  thing.     How  she  must  have  loved  him !  " 

"  Men  don't  want  to  be  loved  that  way.  That's  the 
mistake  you  women  will  make." 

"  It's  the  way  you've  taught  us.  I  should  like  to  know 
what  other  way  you  ever  want  us  to  love  you  ?  " 

"  The  way  Veronica  loves  Nicky,  and  Dorothy  loved 
Drayton  and  Trances  loves  Anthony." 

"  Dorothy  ?     She  ruined  Drayton's  life." 

"  Men's  lives  aren't  ruined  that  way.  And  not  all 
women's." 

"  Well,  anyhow,  if  she'd  loved  him  she'd  have  married 
him.  And  Trances  loves  her  children  better  than  An- 
thony, and  Anthony  knows  it." 

"  Veronica,  then." 

"  Veronica  doesn't  know  what  passion  is.  The  poor 
child's  anaemic." 

"  Another  mistake.  Veronica,  and  '  children '  like 
Veronica  have  more  passion  in  one  eyelash  than  you  have 
in  your  whole  body." 

"  It's  a  pity,"  she  said,  "  you  can't  have  Veronica  and 
her  eyelashes  instead  of  me.  She's  young  and  she's 
pretty." 

He  sighed  with  pain  as  her  nerves  lashed  into  his. 

"  That's  what  it  all  amounts  to  —  your  wanting  to  get 
out  to  the  Front.  It's  what's  the  matter  with  half  the 
men  who  go  there  and  pose  as  heroes.  They  want  to  get 
rid  of  the  wives  —  and  mistresses  —  they're  tired  of  be- 
cause the  poor  things  aren't  young  or  pretty  any  longer." 

She  dropped  into  the  mourning  voice  that  made  him 
mad  with  her.     "  I'm  old  —  old  —  old.     And  the  War's 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  345 

making  me  older  every  day,  and  uglier.  And  I'm  not 
married  to  you.  Talk  of  keeping  you !  How  can  I  keep 
you  when  I'm  old  and  ugly  ?  " 

lie  loked  at  her  and  smiled  with  a  hard  pity.  Com- 
punction always  worked  in  him  at  the  sight  of  her  hag- 
gard face,  glazed  and  stained  with  crying. 

"  That's  how  —  by  getting  older. 

"  I've  never  tired  of  you.  You're  more  to  me  now 
than  you  were  when  I  first  knew  you.  It's  when  I  see 
you  looking  old  that  I'm  sure  I  love  you." 

She  smiled,  too,  in  her  sad  sexual  wisdom. 

"  There  may  be  women  who'd  believe  you,  Larry,  or 
who'd  say  they  believe  you;  but  not  me." 

"  It's  the  truth,"  he  said.  "  If  you  were  young  and  if 
you  were  married  to  me  I  should  have  enlisted  months 
ago. 

"  Can't  you  see  it's  not  you,  it's  this  life  we  lead  that 
I'm  sick  and  tired  of?  I  tell  you  I'd  rather  be  hanged 
than  go  on  with  it.  I'd  rather  be  a  prisoner  in  Germany 
than  shut  up  in  this  house  of  yours." 

"  Poor  little  house.  You  used  to  like  it.  What's 
wrong  with  it  now  ?  " 

"  Everything.  Those  damned  lime-trees  all  round  it. 
And  that  damned  white  wall  round  the  lime-trees.  Shut- 
ting me  in. 

"  And  those  curtains  in  your  bed-room.  Shutting  me 
in. 

"  And  your  mind,  trying  to  shut  mine  in. 

"  I  come  into  this  room  and  I  find  Phyllis  Desmond  in 
it  and  Orde-Jones,  drinking  tea  and  talking.  I  go  up- 
stairs for  peace,  and  Michael  and  Ellis  are  sitting  there 


346  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

—  talking ;  trying  to  persuade  themselves  that  funk's  the 
divinest  thing  in  God's  universe. 

"  And  over  there's  the  one  thing  I've  been  looking  for 
all  my  life  —  the  one  thing  I've  cared  for.  And  you're 
keeping  me  from  it." 

They  left  it.  But  it  began  all  over  again  the  next  day 
and  the  next.  And  Lawrence  went  on  growing  his  mous- 
tache and  trying  to  train  it  upwards  in  the  way  she  hated. 

One  evening,  towards  dinner-time  he  turned  up  in 
khaki,  the  moustache  stiff  on  his  long  upper  lip,  his 
lopping  hair  clipped.  He  was  another  man,  a  strange 
man,  and  she  was  not  sure  whether  she  hated  him  or  not. 

But  she  dried  her  eyes  and  dressed  her  hair,  and  put 
on  her  best  gown  to  do  honour  to  his  khaki. 

She  said,  "  It'll  be  like  living  with  another  man." 

"  You  won't  have  very  long  to  live  with  him,"  said 
Lawrence. 

And  even  then,  sombrely,  under  the  shadow  of  his  des- 
tiny, her  passion  for  him  revived;  his  very  strangeness 
quickened  it  to  violence,  to  perversity. 

And  in  the  morning  the  Army  took  him  from  her;  it 
held  him  out  of  her  reach.  He  refused  to  let  her  go  with 
him  to  the  place  where  he  was  stationed. 

"  "What  would  you  do,"  she  said,  "  if  I  followed  you  ? 
Shoot  me  ?  " 

"  I  might  shoot  myself.  Anyhow,  you'd  never  see  me 
or  hear  from  me  again." 

He  went  out  to  France  three  weeks  before  Nicholas. 
She  had   worn  herself  out  with   wonderina;  when  he 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  347 

would  be  sent,  till  she,  too,  was  in  a  hurry  for  him  to  go 
and  end  it.  Now  that  he  had  gone  she  felt  nothing  but  a 
clean  and  sane  relief  that  was  a  sort  of  peace.  She  told 
herself  that  she  would  rather  he  were  killed  soon  than 
that  she  should  be  tortured  any  longer  with  suspense. 

"If  I  saw  his  name  in  the  lists  this  morning  I 
shouldn't  mind.     That  would  end  it." 

And  she  sent  her  servant  to  the  stationer's  to  stop  the 
papers  for  fear  lest  she  should  see  his  name  in  the  lists. 

But  Lawrence  spared  her.  He  was  wounded  in  his 
first  engagement,  and  died  of  his  wounds  in  a  hospital  at 
Dunkirk. 

The  Red  Cross  woman  who  nursed  him  wrote  to  Vera 
an  hour  before  he  died.     She  gave  details  and  a  message. 

"  7.30.  I'm  writing  now  from  his  dictation.  He  says 
you're  to  forgive  him  and  not  to  be  too  sorry,  because  it 
was  what  he  thought  it  would  be  (he  means  the  fighting) 
only  much  more  so  —  all  except  this  last  bit. 

"  He  wants  you  to  tell  Michael  and  Dicky  %  —  Nicky  ? 
—  that.  He  says :  '  It's  odd  I  should  be  first  when  he 
got  the  start  of  me.' 

"(I  think  he  means  you're  to  forgive  him  for  leaving 
you  to  go  to  the  War.)" 

"  8.30.     It  is  all  over. 

"  He  was  too  weak  to  say  anything  more.  But  he  sent 
you  his  love." 


up, 


Vera  said  to  herself :     "  He  didn't.     She  made  that 


348  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

She  hated  the  Red  Cross  woman  who  had  been  with 
Lawrence  and  had  seen  so  much ;  who  had  dared  to  tell 
her  what  he  meant  and  to  make  up  messages. 


XXIII 

Nicholas  had  applied  for  a  commission,  and  he  had 
got  it,  and  Frances  was  glad. 

She  had  been  proud  of  him  because  he  had  chosen  the 
ranks  instead  of  the  Officers'  Training  Corps ;  but  she 
persisted  in  the  belief  that,  when  it  came  to  the  trenches, 
second  lieutenants  stood  a  better  chance.  "  For  good- 
ness' sake,"  Nicholas  had  said,  "  don't  tell  her  that  they're 
over  the  parapet  first." 

That  was  in  December.  In  February  he  got  a  week's 
leave  —  sudden,  unforeseen  and  special  leave.  It  had  to 
be  broken  to  her  this  time  that  leave  as  special  as  that 
meant  war-leave. 

She  said,  "Well,  if  it  does,  I  shall  have  him  for  six 
whole  days."  She  had  learned  how  to  handle  time,  how 
to  prolong  the  present,  drawing  it  out  minute  by  minute ; 
thus  her  happiness,  stretched  to  the  snapping  point,  vi- 
brated. 

She  had  a  sense  of  its  vibration  now,  as  she  looked  at 
Nicholas.  It  was  the  evening  of  the  day  he  had  come 
home,  and  they  were  all  in  the  drawing-room  together. 
He  was  standing  before  her,  straight  and  tall,  on  the 
hearthrug,  where  he  had  lifted  the  Persian  cat,  Timmy, 
out  of  his  sleep  and  was  holding  him  against  his  breast. 
Timmy  spread  himself  there,  softly  and  heavily,  hanging 

349 


350  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

on  to  Nicky's  shoulder  by  his  claws;  he  butted  Nicky's 
chin  with  his  head,  purring. 

"  I  don't  know  how  I'm  to  tear  myself  away  from 
Timmy.  I  should  like  to  wear  him  alive  as  a  waistcoat. 
Or  hanging  on  my  shoulder  like  a  cape,  with  his  tail 
curled  tight  round  my  neck.  He'd  look  uncommonly 
chic  with  all  his  khaki  patches." 

"  Why  don't  you  take  him  with  you  ?  "     Anthony  said. 

"  'Cos  he's  Eonny's  cat." 

"  He  isn't.     I've  given  him  to  you,"  Veronica  said. 

"  When  ?  " 

"  Now,  this  minute.  To  sleep  on  your  feet  and  keep 
you  warm." 

Frances  listened  and  thought :  "  What  children  — 
what  babies  they  are,  after  all."  If  only  this  minute 
could  be  stretched  out  farther. 

"  I  mustn't,"  Nicky  said.  "  I  should  spend  hours  in 
dalliance ;  and  if  a  shell  got  him  it  would  ruin  my  morale." 

Timmy,  unhooked  from  Nicky's  shoulder,  lay  limp  in 
his  arms.  He  lay  on  his  back,  in  ecstasy,  his  legs  apart, 
showing  the  soft,  cream-white  fur  of  his  stomach.  Nicky 
rubbed  his  face  against  the  soft,  cream-white  fur. 

"  I  say,  what  a  heavenly  death  it  would  be  to  die  — 
smothered  in  Timmies." 

"  Nicky,  you're  a  beastly  sensualist.  That's  what's 
the  matter  with  you,"  John  said.     And  they  all  laughed. 

The  minute  broke,  stretched  to  its  furthest. 

Trances  was  making  plans  now  for  Nicky's  week. 
There  were  things  they  could  do,  plays  they  could  see, 
places  they  could  go  to.     Anthony  would  let  them  have 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  351 

the  big  car  as  much  as  they  wanted.  For  you  could 
stretch  time  out  by  filling  it;  you  could  multiply  the 
hours  by  what  they  held. 

"  Ronny  and  I  are  going  to  get  married  to-morrow," 
Nicky  said.  "  We  settled  it  that  we  would  at  once,  if  I 
got  war-leave.     It's  the  best  thing  to  do." 

"  Of  course,"  Frances  said,  "  it's  the  best  thing  to  do." 

But  she  had  not  allowed  for  it,  nor  for  the  pain  it  gave 
her.  That  pain  shocked  her.  It  was  awful  to  think  that, 
after  all  her  surrenders,  Nicky's  happiness  could  give  her 
pain.  It  meant  that  she  had  never  let  go  her  secret  hold. 
She  had  been  a  hypocrite  to  herself. 

Nicky  was  talking  on  about  it,  excitedly,  as  he  used  to 
talk  on  about  his  pleasures  when  he  was  a  child. 

"  If  Dad'll  let  us  have  the  racing  car,  we'll  go  down  to 
Morfe.     We  can  do  it  in  a  day." 

"  My  dear  boy,"  Anthony  said,  "  don't  you  know  I've 
lent  the  house  to  the  Red  Cross,  and  let  the  shooting  ?  " 

"  I  don't  care.  There's  the  little  house  in  the  village 
we  can  have.  And  Harker  and  his  wife  can  look  after 
us." 

"  Harker  gone  to  the  War,  and  his  wife's  looking 
after  his  brother's  children  somewhere.  And  I've  put 
two  Belgian  refugees  into  it." 

u  They  can  look  after  us,"  said  Nicky.  "  We'll  stay 
three  days,  run  back,  and  have  one  day  at  home  be- 
fore I  sail." 

Frances  gave  up  her  play  with  time.     She  was  beaten. 

And  still  she  thought :  "  At  least  I  shall  have  him  one 
whole  day." 

And  then  she  looked  across  the  room  to  Michael,  as  if 


352  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Michael's  face  had  signalled  to  her.  His  clear,  sun-burnt 
skin  showed  blotches  of  white  where  the  blood  had  left 
it.  A  light  sweat  was  on  his  forehead.  When  their  eyes 
met,  he  shifted  his  position  to  give  himself  an  appearance 
of  ease. 

Michael  had  not  reckoned  on  his  brother's  marriage, 
either.  It  was  when  he  asked  himself :  "  On  what, 
then,  had  he  been  reckoning  ?  "  that  the  sweat  broke  out 
on  his  forehead. 

He  had  not  reckoned  on  anything.  But  the  sudden 
realization  of  what  he  might  have  reckoned  on  made  him 
sick.  He  couldn't  bear  to  think  of  Eonny  married. 
And  yet  again,  he  couldn't  bear  to  think  of  Nicky  not 
marrying  her.  If  he  had  had  a  hold  on  her  he  would 
have  let  her  go.  In  this  he  knew  himself  to  be  sincere. 
He  had  had  no  hold  on  her,  and  to  talk  about  letting  her 
go  was  idiotic ;  still,  there  was  a  violent  pursuit  and  pos- 
session by  the  mind  —  and  Michael's  mind  was  innocent 
of  jealousy,  that  psychic  assault  and  outrage  on  the 
woman  he  loved.  His  spiritual  surrender  of  her  was  so 
perfect  that  his  very  imagination  gave  her  up  to  Nicky. 

He  was  glad  that  they  were  going  to  be  married  to- 
morrow. Nothing  could  take  their  three  days  from  them, 
even  when  the  War  had  done  its  worst. 

And  then,  with  his  mother's  eyes  on  him,  he  thought: 
"  Does  she  think  I  was  reckoning  on  that  ?  " 

Nicholas  and  Veronica  were  married  the  next  morning 
at  Hampstead  Town  Hall,  before  the  Registrar. 

They  spent  the  rest  of  the  day  in  Anthony's  racing  car, 
defying  and  circumventing  time  and  space  and  the  police, 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  353 

tearing,  Nicky  said,  whole  handfuls  out  of  eternity  by 
sheer  speed.  At  intervals,  with  a  clear  run  before  him, 
he  let  out  the  racing  car  to  its  top  speed  on  the  Great 
North  Road.  It  snorted  and  purred  and  throbbed  like 
some  immense,  nervous  animal,  but  lightly  and  purely  as 
if  all  its  weight  were  purged  from  it  by  speed.  It  flew 
up  and  down  the  hills  of  Hertfordshire  and  Buckingham- 
shire and  out  on  to  the  flat  country  round  Peterborough 
and  Grantham,  a  country  of  silver  green  and  emerald 
green  grass  and  purple  fallow  land  and  bright  red 
houses;  and  so  on  to  the  great  plain  of  York,  and  past 
Reyburn  up  towards  the  bare  hill  country  netted  with 
grey  stone  walls. 

Nicholas  slowed  the  car  down  for  the  winding  of  the 
road. 

It  went  now  between  long  straight  ramparts  of  hills 
that  showed  enormous  and  dark  against  a  sky  cleared  to 
twilight  by  the  unrisen  moon.  Other  hills,  round-topped, 
darker  still  and  more  enormous,  stood  piled  up  in  front 
of  them,  blocking  the  head  of  Rathdale. 

Then  the  road  went  straight,  and  Nicholas  was  reck- 
less. It  was  as  if,  ultimately,  they  must  charge  into  the 
centre  of  that  incredibly  high,  immense  obstruction. 
They  were  thrilled,  mysteriously,  as  before  the  image  of 
monstrous  and  omnipotent  disaster.  Then  the  dale 
widened;  it  made  way  for  them  and  saved  them. 

The  lights  of  Morfe  on  its  high  platform  made  the 
pattern  of  a  coronet  and  pendants  on  the  darkness;  the 
small,  scattered  lights  of  the  village  below,  the  village 
they  were  making  for,  showed  as  if  dropped  out  of  the 
pattern  on  the  hill. 


354  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

One  larger  light  burned  in  the  room  that  was  their  mar- 
riage chamber.  Jean  and  Suzanne,  the  refugees,  stood 
in  the  white  porch  to  receive  them,  holding  the  lanterns 
that  were  their  marriage  torches.  The  old  woman  held 
her  light  low  down,  lighting  the  flagstone  of  the  threshold. 
The  old  man  lifted  his  high,  showing  the  lintel  of  the 
door.     It  was  so  low  that  Nicholas  had  to  stoop  to  go  in. 

In  the  morning  they  read  the  date  cut  in  the  wall  above 
the  porch:  1665. 

The  house  was  old  and  bent  and  grey.  Its  windows 
were  narrow  slits  in  the  stone  mullions.  It  crouched 
under  the  dipping  boughs  of  the  ash-tree  that  sheltered  it. 
Inside  there  was  just  room  for  Veronica  to  stand  up. 
Nicholas  had  to  stoop  or  knock  his  head  against  the 
beams.  It  had  only  four  rooms,  two  for  Nicholas  and 
Veronica,  and  two  for  Jean  and  Suzanne.  And  it  was 
rather  dark. 

But  it  pleased  them.  They  said  it  was  their  apple- 
tree-house  grown  up  because  they  were  grown  up,  and 
keeping  strict  proportions.  You  had  to  crawl  into  it, 
and  you  were  only  really  comfortable  sitting  or  lying 
down.  So  they  sat  outside  it,  watching  old  Suzanne 
through  the  window  as  she  moved  about  the  house  place, 
cooking  Belgian  food  for  them,  and  old  Jean  as  he  worked 
in  the  garden. 

Veronica  loved  Jean  and  Suzanne.  She  had  found  out 
all  about  them  the  first  morning. 

"  Only  think,  Nicky.  They're  from  Termonde,  and 
their  house  was  burnt  behind  them  as  they  left  it.  They 
saw  horrors,  and  their  son  was  killed  in  the  War. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  355 

"  Yet  they're  happy  and  at  peace.  Almost  as  if  they'd 
forgotten.     He'll  plant  flowers  in  his  garden." 

"  They're  old,  Ronny.  And  perhaps  they  were  tired 
already  when  it  happened." 

"  Yes,  that  must  be  it.     They're  old  and  tired." 

And  now  it  was  the  last  adventure  of  their  last  day. 
They  were  walking  on  the  slope  of  Renton  Moor  that  looks 
over  Rathdale  towards  Grefnngton  Edge.  The  light  from 
the  west  poured  itself  in  vivid  green  down  the  valley  be- 
low them,  broke  itself  into  purple  on  Karva  Hill  to  the 
north  above  Morfe,  and  was  beaten  back  in  subtle  blue 
and  violet  from  the  stone  rampart  of  the  Edge. 

Nicholas  had  been  developing,  in  fancy,  the  strategic 
resources  of  the  country.  Guns  on  Renton  Moor,  guns 
along  Greffington  Edge,  on  Sarrack  Moor.  The  raking 
lines  of  the  hills  were  straight  as  if  they  had  been  meas- 
ured with  a  ruler  and  then  planed. 

"  Ronny,"  he  said  at  last,  "we've  licked  'em  in  the 
first  round,  you  and  I.  The  beastly  Boche  can't  do  us 
out  of  these  three  days." 

"  No.  We've  been  absolutely  happy.  And  we'll  never 
forget  it.     Never." 

"  Perhaps  it  was  a  bit  rough  on  Dad  and  Mummy,  our 
carting  ourselves  up  here,  away  from  them.  But,  you 
see,  they  don't  really  mind.  They're  feeling  about  it  now 
just  as  we  feel  about  it.     I  knew  they  would." 

There  had  been  a  letter  from  Frances  saying  she  was 
glad  they'd  gone.  She  was  so  happy  thinking  how  happy 
they  were. 

"  They're  angels,  Nicky." 


356  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Aren't  they  ?  Simply  angels.  That's  the  rotten  part 
of  it.     I  wish  — 

"  I  wish  I  could  tell  them  what  I  think  of  them.  But 
you  can't,  somehow.  It  sticks  in  your  throat,  that  sort 
of  thing." 

"  You  needn't,"  she  said ;  "  they  know  all  right." 

She  thought :  "  This  is  what  he  wants  me  to  tell  them 
about  —  afterwards." 

"  Yes,  but  —  I  must  have  hurt  them  —  hurt  them  hor- 
ribly —  lots  of  times.     I  wish  I  hadn't. 

"  But  "  he  went  on,  "  they're  funny,  you  know.  Dad 
actually  thought  it  idiotic  of  us  to  do  this.  He  said  it 
would  only  make  it  harder  for  us  when  I  had  to  go. 
They  don't  see  that  it's  just  piling  it  on  —  going  from  one 
jolly  adventure  to  another. 

"  I'm  afraid,  though,  what  he  really  meant  was  it  was 
hard  on  you;  because  the  rest  of  it's  all  my  show." 

"  But  it  isn't  all  your  show,  Nicky  darling.  It's  mine, 
and  it's  theirs  —  because  we  haven't  grudged  you  your 
adventure." 

"  That's  exactly  how  I  want  you  to  feel  about  it." 

"  And  they're  assuming  that  I  shan't  come  back. 
Which,  if  you  come  to  think  of  it,  is  pretty  big  cheek. 
They  talk,  and  they  think,  as  though  nobody  ever  got 
through.  Whereas  I've  every  intention  of  getting 
through  and  of  coming  back.  I'm  the  sort  of  chap  who 
does  get  through,  who  does  come  back." 

"  And  even  if  I  wasn't,  if  they  studied  statistics  they'd 
see  that  it's  a  thousand  chances  to  one  against  the  Boches 
getting  me  —  just  me  out  of  all  the  other  chaps.  As  if 
I  was  so  jolly  important. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  357 

"  No ;  don't  interrupt.  Let's  get  this  thing  straight 
while  we  can.  Supposing  —  just  supposing  I  didn't  get 
through  —  didn't  come  back  —  supposing  I  was  unlike 
myself  and  got  killed,  I  want  you  to  think  of  that,  not  aa 
a  clumsy  accident,  but  just  another  awfully  interesting 
thing  I'd  done. 

"  Because,  you  see,  you  might  be  going  to  have  a  baby ; 
and  if  you  took  the  thing  as  a  shock  instead  of  —  of  what 
it  probably  really  is,  and  went  and  got  cut  up  about  it, 
you  might  start  the  little  beggar  with  a  sort  of  fit,  and 
shake  its  little  nerves  up,  so  that  it  would  be  jumpy  all 
its  life. 

"  It  ought,"  said  Nicky,  "  to  sit  in  its  little  house  all 
quiet  and  comfy  till  it's  time  for  it  to  come  out." 

He  was  struck  with  a  sudden,  poignant  realization  of 
what  might  be,  what  probably  would  be,  what  ought  to 
be,  what  he  had  wanted  more  than  anything,  next  to 
Veronica. 

"  It  shall,  Nicky,  it  shall  be  quiet  and  comfy." 

"  If  that  came  off  all  right,"  he  said,  "  it  would  make 
it  up  to  Mother  no  end." 

"  It  wouldn't  make  it  up  to  me." 

"  You  don't  know  what  it  would  do,"  he  said. 

She  thought :  "  I  don't  want  it.  I  don't  want  any- 
thing but  you." 

"  That's  why,"  he  went  on,  "  I'm  giving  Don  as  the 
next  of  kin  —  the  one  they'll  wire  to ;  because  it  won't 
take  him  that  way;  it'll  only  make  him  madder  to  get  out 
and  do  for  them.  I'm  afraid  of  you  or  Mummy  or  Dad, 
or  Michael  being  told  first." 

"  It  doesn't  matter  a  bit  who's  told  first.     I  shall  know 


358  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

first,"  she  said.  "  And  you  needn't  be  afraid.  It  won't 
kill  either  me  or  the  baby.  If  a  shock  could  kill  me  I 
should  have  died  long  ago." 

"  When  ? " 

"  When  you  went  to  Desmond.  Then,  when  I  thought 
I  couldn't  bear  it  any  longer,  something  happened." 

"What?" 

"  I  don't  know.  I  don't  know  what  it  is  now ;  I  only 
know  what  it  does.  It  always  happens  —  always  — 
when  you  want  it  awfully.  And  when  you're  quiet  and 
give  yourself  up  to  it." 

"  It'll  happen  again." 

He  listened,  frowning  a  little,  not  quite  at  ease,  not 
quite  interested;  puzzled,  as  if  he  had  lost  her  trail;  put 
off,  as  if  something  had  come  between  him  and  her. 

"  You  can  make  it  happen  to  other  people,"  she  was 
saying ;  "  so  that  when  things  get  too  awful  they  can  bear 
them.  I  wanted  it  to  happen  to  Dorothy  when  she  was 
in  prison,  and  it  did.  She  said  she  was  absolutely  happy 
there;  and  that  all  sorts  of  queer  things  came  to  her. 
And,  Nicky,  they  were  the  same  queer  things  that  came 
to  me.     It  was  like  something  getting  through  to  her." 

"  I  say  —  did  you  ever  do  it  to  me  ?  " 

"  Only  once,  when  you  wanted  it  awfully." 

"  When  ?     When  ?  " 

Now  he  was  interested;  he  was  intrigued;  he  was  on 
her  trail. 

"  When  Desmond  did  —  that  awful  thing.  I  wanted 
you  to  see  that  it  didn't  matter,  it  wasn't  the  end." 

"  But  that's  just  what  I  did  see,  what  I  kept  on  telling 
myself.     It  looks  as  if  it  worked,  then  ?  " 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  359 

"  It  doesn't  always.  It  comes  and  goes.  But  I  think 
with  you  it  would  always  come;  because  you're  more  me 
than  other  people;  I  mean  I  care  more  for  you." 

She  closed  and  clinched  it.  "  That's  why  you're  not 
to  bother  about  me,  Nicky.  If  the  most  awful  thing  hap- 
pened, and  you  didn't  come  back,  It  would  come." 

"  I  wish  I  knew  what  It  was,"  he  said. 

"  I  don't  know  what  it  is.  But  it's  so  real  that  I  think 
it's  God." 

"  That's  why  they're  so  magnificently  brave  —  Dorothy 
and  Aunt  Frances  and  all  of  them.  They  don't  believe 
in  it;  they  don't  know  it's  there;  even  Michael  doesn't 
know  it's  there  —  yet ;  and  still  they  go  on  bearing  and 
bearing;  and  they  were  glad  to  give  you  up." 

"  I  know,"  he  said ;  "  lots  of  people  say  they're  glad, 
but  they  really  are  glad." 

He  meditated. 

"  There's  one  thing.  I  can't  think  what  you  do,  unless 
it's  praying  or  something;  and  if  you're  going  to  turn  it 
on  to  me,  Ronny,  I  wish  you'd  be  careful;  because  it 
seems  to  me  that  if  there's  anything  in  it  at  all,  there 
might  be  hitches.  I  mean  to  say,  you  might  work  it  just 
enough  to  keep  me  from  being  killed  but  not  enough  to 
keep  my  legs  from  being  blown  off.  Or  the  Boches 
might  get  me  fair  enough  and  you  might  bring  me  back, 
all  paralysed  and  idiotic. 

"  That's  what  I  should  funk.  I  should  funk  it  most 
damnably,  if  I  thought  about  it.  Luckily  one  doesn't 
think." 

"  But,  Nicky,  I  shouldn't  try  to  keep  you  back  then 
any  more  than  I  tried  before." 


360  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  You  wouldn't  ?     Honour  bright  ?  " 

"  Of  course  1  wouldn't.  It  wouldn't  be  playing  the 
game.  To  begin  with,  I  won't  believe  that  you're  not  go- 
ing to  get  through. 

"  But  if  you  didn't  —  if  you  didn't  come  back  —  I  still 
wouldn't  believe  you'd  gone.  I  should  say,  '  He  hasn't 
cared.  He's  gone  on  to  something  else.  It  doesn't  end 
him.'  " 

He  was  silent.  The  long  rampart  of  the  hill,  as  he 
stared  at  it,  made  a  pattern  on  his  mind;  a  pattern  that 
he  paid  no  attention  to. 

Veronica  followed  the  direction  of  his  eyes.  "  Do  you 
mind  talking  about  it  ?  "  she  said. 

"  Me  ?  Rather  not.  It  sort  of  interests  me.  I  don't 
know  whether  I  believe  in  your  thing  or  not;  but  I've 
always  had  that  feeling,  that  you  go  on.  You  don't 
stop;  you  can't  stop.  That's  why  I  don't  care.  They 
used  to  think  I  was  trying  to  be  funny  when  I  said  I 
didn't  care.  But  I  really  didn't.  Things,  most  things, 
don't  much  matter,  because  there's  always  something 
else.     You  go  on  to  it. 

"  I  care  for  you.  You  matter  most  awfully;  and  my 
people ;  but  most  of  all  you.  You  always  have  mattered 
to  me  more  than  anything,  since  the  first  time  I  heard  you 
calling  out  to  me  to  come  and  sit  on  your  bed  because  you 
were  frightened.     You  always  will  matter. 

"  But  Desmond  didn't  a  little  bit.  You  nced'nt  have 
tried  to  make  me  think  she  didn't.  She  really  didn't. 
I  only  married  her  because  she  was  going  to  have  a  baby. 
And  that  was  because  I  remembered  you  and  the  rotten 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  361 

time  you'd  had.  I  believe  that  would  have  kept  me 
straight  with  women  if  nothing  else  did. 

"  Of  course  I  was  an  idiot  about  it.  I  didn't  think  of 
marrying  you  till  Vera  told  me  I  ought  to  have  waited. 
Then  it  was  too  late. 

"  That's  why  I  want  you  most  awfully  to  have  a  baby." 

"  Yes,  Is  icky. 

"  I'll  tell  you  what  I'm  going  to  do  when  I  know  it's 
coming.  The  cottage  belongs  to  Uncle  Anthony,  doesn't 
it?" 

"  Yes." 

"  Well,  I  love  it.  Do  you  think  he'd  let  me  live  in 
it?" 

"  I  think  he'd  give  it  to  you  if  you  asked  him." 

"  For  my  very  own.  Like  the  apple-tree  house.  Very 
well,  he'll  give  to  me  —  I  mean  to  both  of  us  —  and  I 
shall  come  up  here  where  it's  all  quiet  and  you'd  never 
know  there  was  a  war  at  all  —  even  the  Belgians  have 
forgotten  it.  And  I  shall  sit  out  here  and  look  at  that 
hill,  because  it's  straight  and  beautiful.  I  won't  —  I 
simply  won't  think  of  anything  that  isn't  straight  and 
beautiful.  And  I  shall  get  strong.  Then  the  baby  will 
be  straight  and  beautiful  and  strong,  too. 

"  I  shall  try  —  I  shall  try  hard,  Nicky  —  to  make  him 
like  you." 

Frances's  one  Day  was  not  a  success.  It  was  taken  up 
with  little  things  that  had  to  be  done  for  Nicky.  Always 
they  seemed,  he  and  she,  to  be  on  the  edge  of  something 
great,    something   satisfying   and    revealing.     It   was   to 


362  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

come  in  a  look  or  a  word;  and  both  would  remember  it 
afterwards  for  ever. 

In  the  evening  Grannie,  and  Auntie  Louie,  and  Auntie 
Emmeline,  and  Auntie  Edie,  and  Uncle  Morris,  and 
Uncle  Bartie  came  up  to  say  good-bye.  And  in  the  morn- 
ing Nicholas  went  off  to  France,  excited  and  happy,  as 
he  had  gone  off  on  his  wedding  journey.  And  between 
Frances  and  her  son  the  great  thing  remained  unsaid. 

Time  itself  was  broken.  All  her  minutes  were  scat- 
tered like  fine  sand. 

February  27th,  1915. 
B.  E.  F.,  France. 

Dearest  Mother  and  Dad, —  I  simply  don't  know 
how  to  thank  you  all  for  the  fur  coat.  It's  pronounced 
the  rippingest,  by  a  long  way,  that's  been  seen  in  these 
trenches.  Did  Bonny  really  choose  it  because  it  "  looked 
as  if  it  had  been  made  out  of  Timmy 's  tummy  ?  "  It 
makes  me  feel  as  if  I  was  Timmy.  Timmy  on  his  hind 
legs,  rampant,  clawing  at  the  Boches.  Just  think  of  the 
effect  if  he  got  up  over  the  parapet ! 

The  other  things  came  all  right,  too,  thanks.  When 
you  can't  think  what  else  to  send  let  Nanna  make  an- 
other cake.     And  those  tubes  of  chutney  are  a  good  idea. 

No;  it's  no  earthly  use  worrying  about  Michael.  If 
there  was  no  English  and  no  Allies  and  no  Enthusiasm, 
and  he  had  this  War  all  to  himself,  you  simply  couldn't 
keep  him  out  of  it.  I  believe  if  old  Mick  could  send  him- 
self out  by  himself  against  the  whole  German  Army  he'd 
manage  to  put  in  some  first  rate  fancy  work  in  the  second 
or  two  before  they  got  him.  He'd  be  quite  capable  of  go- 
ing off  and  doing  grisly  things  that  would  make  me  faint 
with  funk,  if  he  was  by  himself,  with  nothing  but  the  eye 
of  God  to  look  at  him.  And  then  he'd  rather  God  wasn't 
there.  He  always  was  afraid  of  having  a  crowd  with 
him. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  363 

The  pity  is  he's  wasting  time  and  missing  such  a  lot. 
If  I  were  you  two,  I  should  bank  on  Don.  He's  the  sensi- 
blest  of  us,  though  he  is  the  youngest. 

And  don't  worry  about  me.  Do  remember  that  even 
in  the  thickest  curtain  fire  there  are  holes ;  there  are  more 
holes  than  there  is  stuff;  and  the  chances  are  I  shall  be 
where  a  hole  is. 

Another  thing,  Don's  shell,  the  shell  you  see  making 
straight  for  you  like  an  express  train,  isn't  likely  to  be 
the  shell  that's  going  to  get  you ;  so  that  if  you're  hit  you 
don't  feel  that  pang  of  personal  resentment  which  must 
be  the  worst  part  of  the  business.  Bits  of  shells  that 
have  exploded  I  rank  with  bullets  which  we  knew  all 
about  before  and  were  prepared  for.  Really,  if  you're 
planted  out  in  the  open,  the  peculiar  awfulness  of  big 
shell-fire  —  what  is  it  more  than  the  peculiar  awfulness 
of  being  run  over  by  express  trains  let  loose  about  the 
sky?  Tell  Don  that  when  shrapnel  empties  itself  over 
your  head  like  an  old  tin  pail,  you  might  feel  injured, 
but  the  big  shell  has  a  most  disarming  air  of  not  being 
able  to  help  itself,  of  not  looking  for  anybody  in  particu- 
lar. It's  so  innocent  of  personal  malice  that  I'd  rather 
have  it  any  day  than  fat  German  fingers  squeezing  my 
windpipe. 

That's  an  answer  to  his  question. 

And  Dorothy  wanted  to  know  what  it  feels  like  going 
into  action.  Well  —  there's  a  lot  of  it  that  perhaps  she 
wouldn't  believe  in  if  I  told  her  —  it's  the  sort  of  thing 
she  never  has  believed;  but  Stephen  was  absolutely  right. 
You  aren't  sold.  It's  more  than  anything  you  could  have 
imagined.     I'm  not  speaking  only  for  myself. 

There's  just  one  beastly  sensation  when  you're  half 
way  between  your  parapet  and  theirs  —  other  fellows  say 
they've  felt  it  too  —  when  you're  afraid  it  (the  feeling) 
should  fizzle  out  before  you  get  there.  But  it  doesn't. 
It  grows  more  and  more  so,  simply  swinging  you  on  to 
them,  and  that  swing  makes  up  for  all  the  rotten  times 


364  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

put  together.     You  needn't  be  sorry  for  us.     It's  waste 
of  pity. 

I  know  Don  and  Dorothy  and  Dad  and  Ronny  aren't 
sorry  for  us.  But  I'm  not  so  sure  of  Michael  and 
Mother. —  Always  your  loving, 

Nicxy. 

May,  1915. 
B.  E.   F.,  France. 

My  dear  Mick, —  It's  awfully  decent  of  you  to  write  so 
often  when  you  loathe  writing,  especially  about  things  that 
bore  you.  But  you  needn't  do  that.  We  get  the  news 
from  the  other  fronts  in  the  papers  more  or  less;  and  I 
honestly  don't  care  a  damn  what  Asquith  is  saying  or  what 
Lloyd  George  is  doing  or  what  Northcliffe's  motives  are. 
Personally,  I  should  say  he  was  simply  trying,  like  most  of 
us,  to  save  his  country.  Looks  like  it.  But  you  can  tell 
him  from  me,  if  he  gets  them  to  send  us  enough  shells 
out  in  time  we  shan't  worry  about  his  motives.  Anyhow 
that  sort  of  thing  isn't  in  your  line,  old  man,  and  Dad 
can  do  it  much  better  than  you,  if  you  don't  mind  my  say- 
ing so. 

What  I  want  to  know  is  what  Don  and  Dorothy  are  do- 
ing, and  the  last  sweet  thing  Dad  said  to  Mother  —  I'd 
give  a  day's  rest  in  my  billet  for  one  of  his  worst  jokes. 
And  I  like  to  hear  about  Morrie  going  on  the  bust  again, 
too  —  it  sounds  so  peaceful.  Only  if  it  really  is  anxiety 
about  me  that  makes  him  do  it,  I  wish  he'd  leave  off 
thinking  about  me,  poor  old  thing. 

More  than  anything  I  want  to  know  how  Ronny  is ; 
how  she's  looking  and  what  she's  feeling ;  you'll  be  able  to 
make  out  a  lot,  and  she  may  tell  you  things  she  won't  tell 
the  others.  That's  why  I'm  glad  you're  there  and  not 
here. 

And  as  for  that  —  why  go  on  worrying  ?  I  do  know 
how  you  feel  about  it.  I  think  I  always  did,  in  a  way. 
I  never  thought  you  were  a   "  putrid  Pacifist."     Your 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  365 

mind's  all  right.  You  say  the  War  takes  me  like  re- 
ligion ;  perhaps  it  does ;  1  don't  know  enough  about 
religion  to  say,  but  it  seems  near  enough  for  a  first  shot. 
And  when  you  say  it  doesn't  take  you  that  way,  that  you 
haven't  "got"  it,  I  can  see  that  that  expresses  a  fairly 
understandable  state  of  mind.  Of  course,  I  know  it  isn't 
funk.  If  you'd  happened  to  think  of  the  Ultimatum  first, 
instead  of  the  Government,  you'd  have  been  in  at  the 
start,  before  me. 

Well  —  there's  such  a  thing  as  conversion,  isn't  there  \ 
You  never  can  tell  what  may  happen  to  you,  and  the  War 
isn't  over  yet.  Those  of  us  who  are  in  it  now  aren't  go- 
ing to  see  the  best  of  it  by  a  long  way.  There's  no  doubt 
the  very  finest  fighting  '11  be  at  the  finish;  so  that  the 
patriotic  beggars  who  were  in  such  a  hurry  to  join  up  Avill 
be  jolly  well  sold,  poor  devils.  Take  me,  for  instance. 
If  I'd  got  what  I  wanted  and  been  out  in  Flanders  in 
1914,  ten  to  one  I  should  have  been  in  the  retreat  from 
Mons,  like  Frank,  and  never  anywhere  else.  Then  I'd 
have  given  my  head  to  have  gone  to  Gallipoli ;  but  now, 
well,  I'm  just  as  glad  I'm  not  mixed  up  in  that  affair. 

Still,  that's  not  the  way  to  look  at  it,  calculating  the  fun 
you  can  get  out  of  it  for  yourself.  And  it's  certainly 
not  the  way  to  win  the  War.  At  that  rate  one  might  go 
on  saving  oneself  up  for  the  Rhine,  while  all  the  other 
fellows  were  getting  pounded  to  a  splash  on  the  way  there. 
So  if  you're  going  to  be  converted  let's  hope  you'll  be 
converted  quick. 

Jf  you  are,  my  advice  is,  try  to  get  your  commission 
straight  away.  There  are  things  you  won't  be  able  to 
stand  if  you're  a  Tommy.  For  instance,  having  to  pig  it 
on  the  floor  with  all  your  brother  Tommies.  I  slept  for 
three  months  next  to  a  beastly  blighter  who  used  to  come 
in  drunk  and  tread  on  my  face  and  be  ill  all  over  me. 

Even  now,  when  I  look  back  on  it,  that  seems  worse 
than  anything  that's  happened  out  here.  But  that's  be- 
cause at  home  your  mind  isn't  adjusted  to  horrors.     That 


366  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

chap  came  as  a  shock  and  a  surprise  to  me  every  time. 
I  couldn't  get  used  to  him.  Whereas  out  here  every- 
thing's shifted  in  the  queerest  way.  Your  mind  shifts. 
You  funk  your  first  and  your  second  sight,  say,  of  a  bad 
stretcher  case ;  but  when  it  comes  to  the  third  and  the 
fourth  you  don't  funk  at  all;  you're  not  shocked,  you're 
not  a  bit  surprised.  It's  all  in  the  picture,  and  you're 
in  the  picture  too.  There's  a  sort  of  horrible  harmony. 
It's  like  a  certain  kind  of  beastly  dream  which  doesn't 
frighten  you  because  you're  part  of  it,  part  of  the  beastli- 
ness. 

No,  the  thing  that  got  me,  so  far,  more  than  anything 
was  —  what  d'you  think  ?  A  little  dog,  no  bigger  than 
a  kitten,  that  was  run  over  the  other  day  in  the  street  by 
a  motor-cyclist  —  and  a  civilian  at  that.  There  were 
two  or  three  women  round  it,  crying  and  gesticulating. 
It  looked  as  if  they'd  just  lifted  it  out  of  a  bath  of  blood. 
That  made  me  sick.  You  see,  the  little  dog  wasn't  in 
the  picture.     I  hadn't  bargained  for  him. 

Yet  the  things  Morrie  saw  in  South  Africa  —  do  you 
remember  how  he  would  tell  us  about  them  ?  —  weren't 
in  it  with  the  things  that  happened  here.  Pounding 
apart,  the  things  that  corpses  can  do,  apparently  on  their 
own,  are  simply  unbelievable  —  what  the  war  correspond- 
ents call  "  fantastic  postures."  But  I  haven't  got  to  the 
point  when  I  can  slap  my  thighs,  and  roar  with  laughter 
—  if  they  happen  to  be  Germans. 

In  between,  the  boredom  is  so  awful  that  I've  heard 
some  of  our  men  say  they'd  rather  have  things  happen- 
ing. And,  of  course,  we're  all  hoping  that  when  those 
shells  come  along  there  won't  be  quite  so  much  "  be- 
tween." 

Love  to  Ronny  and  Mother  and  all  of  them. —  Your 
very  affectionate, 

Nicholas. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  367 

June  1st,  1915. 
B.    E.  F.,  France. 

My  darling  Konny, —  Yes,  I  think  all  jour  letters 
must  have  come,  because  you've  answered  everything. 
You  always  tell  me  just  what  I  want  to  know.  When  1 
see  the  fat  envelopes  coming  I  know  they're  going  to  be 
chock-full  of  the  things  I've  happened  to  be  thinking 
about.  Don't  let's  ever  forget  to  put  the  dates,  because 
I  make  out  that  I've  always  dreamed  about  you,  too,  the 
nights  you've  written. 

And  so  the  Aunties  are  working  in  the  War  Hospital 
Supply  Depot  ?  It's  frightfully  funny  what  Dorothy 
says  about  their  enjoying  the  War  and  feeling  so  impor- 
tant. Don't  let  her  grudge  it  them,  though;  it's  all  the 
enjoyment,  or  importance,  they're  ever  had  in  their  lives, 
poor  dears.  But  I  shall  know,  if  a  swab  bursts  in  my  in- 
side, that  it's  Auntie  Edie's.  As  for  Auntie  Emmeline's, 
I  can't  even  imagine  what  they'd  be  like  —  monstrosities 
—  or  little  babies  injured  at  birth.  Aunt  Louie's  would 
be  well-shaped  and  firm,  but  erring  a  little  on  the  hard 
side,  don't  you  think  ? 

That  reminds  me,  I  suppose  I  may  tell  you  now  since 
it's  been  in  the  papers,  that  we've  actually  got  Moving 
Fortresses  out  here.  I  haven't  seen  them  yet,  but  a 
fellow  who  has  thinks  they  must  be  uncommonly  like 
Drayton's  and  my  thing.  I  suspect,  from  what  he  says, 
they're  a  bit  better,  though.  We  hadn't  got  the  rocking- 
horse  idea. 

It's  odd  —  this  time  last  year  I  should  have  gone  off 
my  head  with  agony  at  the  mere  thought  of  anybody  get- 
ting in  before  us ;  and  now  I  don't  care  a  bit.  I  do  mind 
rather  for  Drayton's  sake,  though  I  don't  suppose  he 
cares,  either.  The  great  thing  is  that  it's  been  done,  and 
done  better.  Anyway  we've  been  lucky.  Supposing  the 
Germans  had  got  on  to  them,  and  trotted  them  out  first, 
and  one  of  our  own  guns  had  potted  him  or  me,  that 
would  have  been  a  jolly  sell. 


368  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

What  makes  you  ask  after  Tinimy?  I  hardly  like  to 
tell  you  the  awful  thing  that's  happened  to  him.  He  had 
to  travel  down  to  the  base  hospital  on  a  poor  chap  who 
was  shivering  with  shell-shock,  and  —  he  never  came  back 
again.  It  doesn't  matter,  because  the  weather's  so  warm 
now  that  I  don't  want  him.  But  I'm  sorry  because  you 
all  gave  him  to  me  and  it  looks  as  if  I  hadn't  cared  for 
him.     But  I  did.  .  .  . 

June  10  th. 

Sorry  I  couldn't  finish  this  last  week.  Things  de- 
veloped rather  suddenly.  I  wish  I  could  tell  you  what, 
but  we  mustn't  let  on  what  happens,  not  even  now,  when 
it's  done  happening.  Still,  there  are  all  the  other  things 
I  couldn't  say  anything  about  at  the  time. 

If  you  must  know,  I've  been  up  "  over  the  top  "  three 
times  now  since  I  came  out  in  February.  So,  you  see, 
one  gets  through  all  right. 

Well  —  I  tried  ages  ago  to  tell  Dorothy  what  it  was 
like.  It's  been  like  that  every  time  (except  that  I've 
got  over  the  queer  funky  feeling  half-way  through).  It'll 
be  like  that  again  next  time,  I  know.  Because  now  I've 
tested  it.  And,  Ronny  —  I  couldn't  tell  Dorothy  this, 
because  she'd  think  it  was  all  rot  —  but  when  you're  up 
first  out  of  the  trench  and  stand  alone  on  the  parapet,  it's 
absolute  happiness.  And  the  charge  is  —  well,  it's  sim- 
ply heaven.  It's  as  if  you'd  never  really  lived  till  then ; 
I  certainly  hadn't,  not  up  to  the  top-notch,  barring  those 
three  days  we  had  together. 

That's  why  —  this  part's  mostly  for  Michael  —  there's 
something  rotten  about  that  poem  he  sent  me  that  some- 
body wrote,  making  out  that  this  gorgeous  fight-feeling 
(which  is  what  I  suppose  he's  trying  for)  is  nothing  but 
a  form  of  sex-madness.  If  he  thinks  that's  all  there  is  in 
it,  he  doesn't  know  much  about  war,  or  love  either. 
Though  I'm  bound  to  say  there's  a  clever  chap  in  my 
battalion  who  thinks  the  same  thing.  He  says  he  feels 
the  ecstasy,  or  whatever  it  is,  all  right,  just  the  same  as 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  369 

I  do ;  but  that  it's  simply  submerged  savagery  bobbiug  up 
to  the  top  —  a  hiddeu  lust  for  killing,  and  the  hidden 
memory  of  having  killed,  he  called  it.  He's  always 
ashamed  of  it  the  next  day,  as  if  he  had  been  drunk. 

And  my  Sergeant-Major,  bless  him,  says  there's  noth- 
ing in  it  but  "  a  ration  of  rum."  Can't  be  that  in  my 
case  because  I  always  give  mine  to  a  funny  chap  who 
knows  he's  going  to  have  collywobbles  as  soon  as  he  gets 
out  into  the  open. 

But  that  isn't  a  bit  what  I  mean.  They're  all  wrong 
about  it,  because  they  make  it  turn  on  killing,  and  not  on 
your  chance  of  being  killed.  That  —  when  you  realize 
it  —  well,  it's  like  the  thing  you  told  me  about  that  you 
said  you  thought  must  be  God  because  it's  so  real.  I 
didn't  understand  it  then,  but  I  do  now.  You're  bang 
up  against  reality  —  you're  going  clean  into  it  —  and  the 
sense  of  it's  exquisite.  Of  course,  while  one  half  of  you 
is  feeling  like  that,  the  other  half  is  fighting  to  kill  and 
doing  its  best  to  keep  on  this  side  reality.  But  I've  been 
near  enough  to  the  other  side  to  know.  And  I  wish 
Michael's  friend  would  come  out  and  see  what  it's  like 
for  himself.  Or,  better  still,  Mick.  He'd  write  a  poem 
about  it  that  would  make  you  sit  up.  It's  a  sin  that  I 
should  be  getting  all  this  splendid  stuff  when  I  can't  do 
anything  with  it. 

Love  to  all  of  them  and  to  your  darling  self. —  Always 
your  loving, 

Nicky. 

P.S. —  I  wish  you'd  try  to  get  some  notion  of  it  into 
Dad  and  Dorothy  and  Mother.  It  would  save  them  half 
the  misery  they're  probably  going  through. 

The  gardener  had  gone  to  the  War,  and  Veronica  was 
in  the  garden,  weeding  the  delphinium  border. 

It  was  Sunday  afternoon  and  she  was  alone  there.  An- 
thony was  digging  in  the  kitchen  garden,  and  Frances 


370  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

was  with  him,  gathering  green  peas  and  fruit  for  the  hos- 
pital. Every  now  and  then  she  came  through  the  open 
door  on  to  the  flagged  path  of  the  upper  terrace  with  the 
piled  up  baskets  in  her  arms,  and  she  smiled  and  nodded 
to  Veronica. 

It  was  quiet  in  the  garden,  so  that,  when  her  moment 
came,  Veronica  could  time  it  by  the  striking  of  the  clock 
heard  through  the  open  doorway  of  the  house:  four 
strokes ;  and  the  half -hour ;  and  then,  almost  on  the  stroke, 
her  rush  of  pure,  mysterious  happiness. 

Up  till  then  she  had  been  only  tranquil;  and  her  tran- 
quillity made  each  small  act  exquisite  and  delightful,  as 
her  fingers  tugged  at  the  weeds,  and  shook  the  earth  from 
their  weak  roots,  and  the  palms  of  her  hand  smoothed 
over  the  places  where  they  had  been.  She  thought  of  old 
Jean  and  Suzanne,  planting  flowers  in  the  garden  at  Ken- 
ton, and  of  that  tranquillity  of  theirs  that  was  the  saddest 
thing  she  had  ever  seen. 

And  her  happiness  had  come,  almost  on  the  stroke  of  the 
half-hour,  not  out  of  herself  or  out  of  her  thoughts,  but 
mysteriously  and  from  somewhere  a  long  way  off. 

She  turned  to  nod  and  smile  at  Frances  who  was  com- 
ing through  the  door  with  her  basket,  and  it  was  then  that 
she  saw  Nicholas. 

He  stood  on  something  that  looked  like  a  low  wall, 
raised  between  her  and  the  ash-tree;  he  stood  motionless, 
as  if  arrested  in  the  act  of  looking  back  to  see  if  she  were 
following  him.  His  eyes  shone,  vivid  and  blue,  as  they 
always  shone  when  he  was  happy.     He  smiled  at  her,  but 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  371 

with  no  movement  of  his  mouth.  He  shouted  to  her,  but 
with  no  sound. 

Everything  was  still;  her  body  and  her  soul  were  still; 
her  heart  was  still ;  it  beat  steadily. 

She  had  started  forwards  to  go  to  him  when  the  tree 
thrust  itself  between  them,  and  he  was  gone. 

And  Frances  was  still  coming  through  the  door  as 
Veronica  had  seen  her  when  she  turned.  She  was  calling 
to  her  to  come  in  out  of  the  sun. 


XXIV 

The  young  men  had  gone  —  Morton  Ellis,  who  had  said 
he  was  damned  if  he'd  fight  for  his  country;  and  Austin 
Mitchell  who  had  said  he  hadn't  got  a  country ;  and  Mo- 
nier-Owen,  who  had  said  that  England  was  not  a  country 
you  could  fight  for.  George  Wadham  had  gone  long  ago. 
That,  Michael  said,  was  to  be  expected.  Even  a  weak 
gust  could  sweep  young  Wadham  off  his  feet  —  and  he 
had  been  fairly  carried  away.  He  could  no  more  resist 
the  vortex  of  the  War  than  he  could  resist  the  vortex  of 
the  arts. 

Michael  had  two  pitiful  memories  of  the  boy:  one  of 
young  Wadham  swaggering  into  Stephen's  room  in  uni- 
form (the  first  time  he  had  it  on),  flushed  and  pleased 
with  himself  and  talking  excitedly  about  the  "  Great 
Game  " ;  and  one  of  young  Wadham  returned  from  the 
Front,  mature  and  hard,  not  talking  about  the  "  Great 
Game  "  at  all,  and  wincing  palpably  when  other  people 
talked ;  a  young  Wadham  who,  they  said,  ought  to  be  ar- 
rested under  the  Defence  of  the  Realm  Act  as  a  quencher 
of  war-enthusiasms. 

The  others  had  gone  later,  one  by  one,  each  with  his 
own  gesture :  Mitchell  and  Monier-Owen  when  Stephen 
went;  Ellis  the  day  after  Stephen's  death.  It  had  taken 
Stephen's  death  to  draw  him. 

372 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  373 

©nly  Michael  remained. 

He  told  them  they  were  mistaken  if  they  thought  their 
going  would  inspire  him  to  follow  them.  It,  and  Ste- 
phen's death,  merely  intensified  the  bitterness  he  felt  to- 
wards the  War.  He  was  more  than  ever  determined  to 
keep  himself  pure  from  it,  consecrated  to  his  Forlorn 
Hope.  If  they  fell  back,  all  the  more  reason  why  he 
should  go  on. 

And,  while  he  waited  for  the  moment  of  vision,  he  con- 
tinued Stephen's  work  on  the  Green  Review.  Stephen 
had  left  it  to  him  when  he  went  out.  Michael  tried  to  be 
faithful  to  the  tradition  he  thus  inherited;  but  gradually 
Stephen's  spirit  disappeared  from  the  Review  and  its 
place  was  taken  by  the  clear,  hard,  unbreakable  thing 
that  was  Michael's  mind. 

And  Michael  knew  that  he  was  beginning  to  make  him- 
self felt. 

But  Stephen's  staff,  such  as  it  was,  and  nearly  all  his 
contributors  had  gone  to  the  War,  one  after  another,  and 
Michael  found  himself  taking  all  their  places.  He  began 
to  feel  a  strain,  which  he  took  to  be  the  strain  of  over- 
work, and  he  went  down  to  Renton  to  recover. 

That  was  on  the  Tuesday  that  followed  Veronica's 
Sunday. 

He  thought  that  down  there  he  would  get  away  from 
everything  that  did  him  harm:  from  his  father's  and 
mother's  eyes;  from  his  sister's  proud,  cold  face;  and 
from  his  young  brother's  smile;  and  from  Veronica's 
beauty  that  saddened  him ;  and  from  the  sense  of  Nicky's 
danger  that  brooded  as  a  secret  obsession  over  the  house. 
He  would  fill  up  the  awful  empty  space.     He  thought: 


374  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  For  a  whole  fortnight  I  shall  get  away  from  this  in- 
fernal War." 

But  he  did  not  get  away  from  it.  On  every  stage  of 
the  journey  down  he  encountered  soldiers  going  to  the 
Front.  He  walked  in  the  Park  at  Darlington  between 
his  trains,  and  wounded  soldiers  waited  for  him  on  every 
seat,  shuffled  towards  him  round  every  turning,  hobbled 
after  him  on  their  crutches  down  every  path.  Their  eyes 
looked  at  him  with  a  shrewd  hostility.  He  saw  the  young 
Yorkshire  recruits  drinking  in  the  open  spaces.  Ser- 
geants' eyes  caught  and  measured  him,  appraising  his 
physique.  Behind  and  among  them  he  saw  Drayton's, 
and  Reveillaud's,  and  Stephen's  eyes ;  and  young  Wad- 
ham's  eyes,  strange  and  secretive  and  hard. 

At  Reyburn  Michael's  train  was  switched  off  to  a  side 
platform  in  the  open.  Before  he  left  Darlington,  a  thin, 
light  rain  had  begun  to  fall  from  a  shred  of  blown  cloud ; 
and  at  Reyburn  the  burst  mass  was  coming  down.  The 
place  was  full  of  the  noise  of  rain.  The  drops  tapped 
on  the  open  platform  and  hissed  as  the  wind  drove  them 
in  a  running  stream.  They  drummed  loudly  on  the  sta- 
tion roof.  But  these  sounds  went  out  suddenly,  covered 
by  the  trampling  of  feet. 

A  band  of  Highlanders  with  their  bagpipes  marched 
into  the  station.  They  lined  up  solemnly  along  the  open 
platform  with  their  backs  to  Michael's  train  and  their 
faces  to  the  naked  rails  on  the  other  side.  Higher  up 
Michael  could  see  the  breast  of  an  engine;  it  was  back- 
ing, backing,  towards  the  troop-train  that  waited  under 
the  cover  of  the  roof.     He  could  hear  the  clank  of  the 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  375 

coupling  and  the  recoil.  At  that  sound  the  band  had 
their  mouths  to  their  bagpipes  and  their  fingers  ready  on 
the  stops.  Two  or  three  officers  hurried  down  from  the 
station  doors  and  stood  ready. 

The  train  came  on  slowly,  packed  with  men;  men  who 
thrust  their  heads  and  shoulders  through  the  carriage 
windows,  and  knelt  on  the  seats,  and  stood  straining  over 
each  other's  backs  to  look  out;  men  whose  faces  were  scar- 
let with  excitement;  men  with  open  mouths  shouting  for 

The  officers  saluted  as  it  passed.  It  halted  at  the  open 
platform,  and  suddenly  the  pipers  began  to  play. 

Michael  got  out  of  his  train  and  watched. 

Solemnly,  in  the  grey  evening  of  the  rain,  with  their 
faces  set  in  a  sort  of  stern  esctasy,  the  Highlanders 
played  to  their  comrades.  Michael  did  not  know  whether 
their  tune  was  sad  or  gay.  It  poured  itself  into  one 
mournful,  savage,  sacred  cry  of  salutation  and  valedic- 
tion. When  it  stopped  the  men  shouted;  there  were 
voices  that  barked  hoarsely  and  broke ;  voices  that  roared ; 
young  voices  that  screamed,  strung  up  by  the  skirling  of 
the  bagpipes.     The  pipers  played  to  them  again. 

And  suddenly  Michael  was  overcome.  Pity  shook  him 
and  grief  and  an  intolerable  yearning,  and  shame.  For 
one  instant  his  soul  rose  up  above  the  music,  and  was 
made  splendid  and  holy,  the  next  he  cowered  under  it, 
stripped  and  beaten.  He  clenched  his  fists,  hating  this 
emotion  that  stung  him  to  tears  and  tore  at  his  heart  and 
at  the  hardness  of  his  mind. 

As  the  troop-train  moved  slowly  out  of  the  station  the 
pipers,  piping  more  and  more  shrilly,  swung  round  and 


376  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

marched  beside  it  to  the  end  of  the  platform.  The  band 
ceased  abruptly,  and  the  men  answered  with  shout  after 
shout  of  violent  joy ;  they  reared  up  through  the  windows, 
straining  for  the  last  look  —  and  were  gone. 

Michael  turned  to  the  porter  who  lifted  his  luggage 
from  the  rack.     "  What  regiment  are  they  ?  "  he  said. 

"  Camerons,  sir.     Going  to  the  Front." 

The  clear,  uncanny  eyes  of  Veronica's  father  pursued 
him  now. 

At  last  he  had  got  away  from  it. 

In  Rathdale,  at  any  rate,  there  was  peace.  The  hills 
and  their  pastures,  and  the  flat  river  fields  were  at  peace. 
And  in  the  villages  of  Morf e  and  Kenton  there  was  peace ; 
for  as  yet  only  a  few  men  had  gone  from  them.  The 
rest  were  tied  to  the  land,  and  they  were  more  absorbed 
in  the  hay-harvest  than  in  the  War.  Even  the  old  Bel- 
gians in  Veronica's  cottage  were  at  peace.  They  had 
forgotten. 

For  three  days  Michael  himself  had  peace. 

He  went  up  to  Veronica's  hill  and  sat  on  it;  and 
thought  how  for  hundreds  of  miles,  north,  south,  east  and 
west  of  him,  there  was  not  a  soul  whom  he  knew.  In 
all  his  life  he  had  never  been  more  by  himself. 

This  solitude  of  his  had  a  singular  effect  on  Michael's 
mind.  So  far  from  having  got  away  from  the  War  he 
had  never  been  more  conscious  of  it  than  he  was  now. 
What  he  had  got  away  from  was  other  people's  conscious- 
ness. From  the  beginning  the  thing  that  threatened  him 
had  been,  not  the  War  but  this  collective  war-spirit,  clam- 
ouring for  his  private  soul. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  377 

For  the  first  time  since  August,  nineteen-fourteen,  he 
found  himself  thinking,  in  perfect  freedom  and  with  per- 
fect lucidity,  about  the  War.  He  had  really  known,  half 
the  time,  that  it  was  the  greatest  War  of  Independence 
that  had  ever  been.  As  for  his  old  hatred  of  the  British 
Empire,  he  had  seen  long  ago  that  there  was  no  such  thing, 
in  the  continental  sense  of  Empire;  there  was  a  unique 
thing,  the  rule,  more  good  than  bad,  of  an  imperial  people. 
He  had  seen  that  the  strength  of  the  Allies  was  in  exact 
proportion  to  the  strength  and  the  enlightenment  of  their 
democracies.  Reckoning  by  decades,  there  could  be  no 
deadlock  in  the  struggle ;  the  deadlock  meant  a  ten  years' 
armistice  and  another  war.  He  could  not  help  seeing 
these  things.  His  objection  to  occupying  his  mind  with 
them  had  been  that  they  were  too  easy. 

Now  that  he  could  look  at  it  by  himself  he  saw  how  the 
War  might  take  hold  of  you  like  a  religion.  It  was  the 
Great  War  of  Redemption.  And  redemption  meant 
simply  thousands  and  millions  of  men  in  troop-ships  and 
troop-trains  coming  from  the  ends  of  the  world  to  buy  the 
freedom  of  the  world  with  their  bodies.  It  meant  that  the 
very  fields  he  was  looking  over,  and  this  beauty  of  the 
hills,  those  unused  ramparts  where  no  batteries  were  hid, 
and  the  small,  silent  villages,  Morfe  and  Renton,  were 
bought  now  with  their  bodies. 

He  wondered  how  at  this  moment  any  sane  man  could  be 
a  Pacifist.  And,  wondering,  he  felt  a  reminiscent  sting 
of  grief  and  yearning.  But  he  refused,  resolutely,  to  feel 
any  shame. 

His  religion  also  was  good;  and,  anyhow,  you  didn't 
choose  your  religion ;  it  chose  you. 


378  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  on  Saturday  the  letters  came:  John's  letter  en- 
closing the  wire  from  the  War  Office,  and  the  letter  that 
Nicky's  Colonel  had  written  to  Anthony. 

Nicky  was  killed. 

Michael  took  in  the  fact,  and  the  date  (it  was  last  Sun- 
day). There  were  some  official  regrets,  but  they  made 
no  impression  on  him.  John's  letter  made  no  impression 
on  him.     Last  Sunday  Nicky  was  killed. 

He  had  not  even  unfolded  the  Colonel's  letter  yet.  The 
close  black  lines  showed  through  the  thin  paper.  Their 
closeness  repelled  him.  He  did  not  want  to  know 
how  his  brother  had  died ;  at  least  not  yet.  He  was 
afraid  of  the  Colonel's  letter.  He  felt  that  by  simply 
not  reading  it  he  could  put  off  the  unbearable  turn  of  the 
screw. 

He  was  shivering  with  cold.  He  drew  up  his  chair 
to  the  wide,  open  hearth-place  where  there  was  no  fire ;  he 
held  out  his  hands  over  it.  The  wind  swept  down  the 
chimney  and  made  him  colder;  and  he  felt  sick. 

He  had  been  sitting  there  about  an  hour  when  Suzanne 
came  in  and  asked  him  if  he  would  like  a  little  fire,  ne 
heard  himself  saying,  "  No,  thank  you,"  in  a  hard  voice. 
The  idea  of  warmth  and  comfort  was  disagreeable  to  him. 
Suzanne  asked  him  then  if  he  had  had  bad  news?  And 
he  heard  himself  saying:  "Yes,"  and  Suzanne  trying, 
trying  very  gently,  to  persuade  him  that  it  was  perhaps 
only  that  Monsieur  Nicky  was  wounded  ? 

"No?  Then,"  said  the  old  woman,  "he  is  killed." 
And  she  began  to  cry. 

Michael  couldn't  stand  that.  He  got  up  and  opened 
the  door  into  the  outer  room,  and  she  passed  through  be- 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  379 

fore  him,  sobbing  and  whimpering.  Her  voice  came  to 
him  through  the  closed  door  in  a  sharp  cry  telling  Jean 
that  Monsieur  Nicky  was  dead,  and  Jean's  voice  came, 
hushing  her. 

Then  he  heard  the  feet  of  the  old  man  shuffling  across 
the  kitchen  floor,  and  the  outer  door  opening  and  shutting 
softly;  and  through  the  windows  at  the  back  of  the  room, 
he  saw,  without  heeding,  as  the  Belgians  passed  and  went 
up  into  the  fields  together,  weeping,  leaving  him  alone. 

They  had  remembered. 

It  was  then  that  Michael  read  the  Colonel's  letter,  and 
learned  the  manner  of  his  brother's  death :  "...  About 
a  quarter  past  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  his  battalion 
was  being  pressed  back,  when  he  rallied  his  men  and  led 
them  in  as  gallant  an  attack  as  was  ever  made  by  so  small 
a  number  in  this  War.  He  was  standing  on  the  enemy's 
parapet  when  he  was  shot  through  the  heart  and  fell.  By 
a  quarter  to  five  the  trench  was  stormed  and  taken,  owing 
to  his  personal  daring  and  impetus  and  to  the  affection 
and  confidence  he  inspired.  .  .  .  We  hear  it  continually 
said  of  our  officers  and  men  that  '  they're  all  the  same,' 
and  I  daresay  as  far  as  pluck  goes  they  are.  But,  if  I 
may  say  so,  we  all  felt  that  your  son  had  something  that 
we  haven't  got.  .  .  ." 

Michael  lay  awake  in  the  bed  that  had  been  his  brother's 
marriage  bed.  The  low  white  ceiling  sagged  and  bulged 
above  him.  For  three  nights  the  room  had  been  as  if 
Nicky  and  Veronica  had  never  gone  from  it.  They  had 
compelled  him  to  think  of  them.  They  had  lain  where  he 
lay,  falling  asleep  in  each  other's  arms. 


380  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

The  odd  thing  had  been  that  his  acute  and  vivid  sense 
of  them  had  in  no  way  troubled  him.  It  had  been  simply 
there  like  some  exquisite  atmosphere,  intensifying  his 
peace.  He  had  had  the  same  feeling  he  always  had  when 
Veronica  was  with  him.  He  had  liked  to  lie  with  his 
head  on  their  pillow,  to  touch  what  they  had  touched, 
to  look  at  the  same  things  in  the  same  room,  to  go  in  and 
out  through  the  same  doors  over  the  same  floors,  remem- 
bering their  hands  and  feet  and  eyes,  and  saying  to  him- 
self: "They  did  this  and  this";  or,  "That  must  have 
pleased  them." 

It  ought  to  have  been  torture  to  him ;  and  he  could  not 
imagine  why  it  was  not. 

And  now,  on  this  fourth  night,  he  had  no  longer  that 
sense  of  Nicky  and  Veronica  together.  The  room  had 
emptied  itself  of  its  own  memory  and  significance.  He 
was  aware  of  nothing  but  the  bare,  spiritual  space  between 
him  and  Nicky.  He  lay  contemplating  it  steadily  and 
without  any  horror. 

He  thought :  "  This  ends  it.  Of  course  I  shall  go  out 
now.  I  might  have  known  that  this  would  end  it.  He 
knew." 

He  remembered  how  Nicky  had  come  to  him  in  his 
room  that  night  in  August.  He  could  see  himself  sitting 
on  the  side  of  his  bed,  half-dressed,  and  Nicky  standing 
over  him,  talking. 

Nicky  had  taken  it  for  granted  even  then  that  he 
would  go  out  some  time.  He  remembered  how  he  had 
said,  "  Not  yet." 

He  thought :  "  Of  course ;  this  must  have  been  what 
he  meant." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  381 

And  presently  he  fell  asleep,  exhausted  and  at  the  same 
time  appeased. 

It  was  morning. 

Michael's  sleep  dragged  him  down;  it  drowned  and 
choked  him  as  he  struggled  to  wake. 

Something  had  happened.  He  would  know  what  it 
was  when  he  came  clear  out  of  this  drowning. 

Now  he  remembered.  Nicky  was  killed.  Last  Sun- 
day. He  knew  that.  But  that  wasn't  all  of  it.  There 
was  something  else  that  followed  on  — 

Suddenly  his  mind  leaped  on  it.  He  was  going  out. 
He  would  be  killed  too.  And  because  he  was  going  out, 
and  because  he  would  be  killed,  he  was  not  feeling  Nicky's 
death  so  acutely  as  he  should  have  thought  he  would  have 
felt  it.     He  had  been  let  off  that. 

He  lay  still  a  moment,  looking  at  the  thing  he  was  going 
to  do,  feeling  a  certain  pleasure  in  its  fitness.  Drayton 
and  Keveillaud  and  Lawrence  had  gone  out,  and  they  had 
been  killed.  Ellis  and  Mitchell  and  Monier-Owen  were 
going  out  and  they  would  certainly  be  killed.  Wadham 
had  gone  out  and  young  Vereker,  and  they  also  would  be 
killed. 

Last  Sunday  it  was  Nicky.     Now  it  must  be  he. 

His  mind  acknowledged  the  rightness  of  the  sequence 
without  concern.  It  was  aware  that  his  going  depended 
on  his  own  will.  But  never  in  all  his  life  had  he  brought 
so  little  imagination  to  the  act  of  willing. 

He  got  up,  bathed  in  the  river,  dressed,  and  ate  his 
breakfast.  He  accepted  each  moment  as  it  arrived,  with- 
out imagination  or  concern. 


382  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

Then  his  mother's  letter  came.  Trances  wrote,  among 
other  things :  "  I  know  how  terrible  you  will  be  feeling 
it,  because  I  know  how  you  cared  for  him.  I  wish  I 
could  comfort  you.  We  could  not  bear  it,  Michael,  if 
we  were  not  so  proud  of  him." 

He  answered  this  letter  at  once.  He  wrote :  "  I 
couldn't  bear  it  either,  if  I  were  not  going  out.  But  of 
course  I'm  going  now." 

As  he  signed  himself,  "  Your  loving  Michael,"  he 
thought :  "  That  settles  it."  Yet,  if  he  had  considered 
what  he  meant  by  settling  it  he  would  have  told  himself 
that  he  meant  nothing ;  that  last  night  had  settled  it ;  that 
his  resolution  had  been  absolutely  self-determined  and  ab- 
solutely irrevocable  then,  and  that  his  signature  gave  it 
no  more  sanctity  or  finality  than  it  had  already.  If  he 
was  conscript,  he  was  conscript  to  his  own  will. 

He  went  out  at  once  with  his  letter,  though  he  knew 
that  the  post  did  not  leave  Renton  for  another  five  hours. 

It  was  the  sliding  of  this  light  thing  and  its  fall  into 
the  letter-box  that  shook  him  into  realization  of  what  he 
had  done  and  of  what  was  before  him.  He  knew  now  why 
he  was  in  such  a  hurry  to  write  that  letter  and  to  post  it. 
By  those  two  slight  acts,  not  dreadful  nor  difficult  in  them- 
selves, he  had  put  it  out  of  his  power  to  withdraw  from  the 
one  supremely  difficult  and  dreadful  act.  A  second  ago, 
while  the  letter  was  still  in  his  hands,  he  could  have  backed 
out,  because  he  had  not  given  any  pledge.  Now  he  would 
have  to  go  through  with  it.  And  he  saw  clearly  for  the 
first  time  what  it  was  that  he  would  have  to  go  through. 

He  left  the  village  and  went  up  to  Renton  Moor  and 
walked  along  the  top  for  miles,  without  knowing  or  caring 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  383 

where  he  went,  and  seeing  nothing  before  him  but  his  own 
act  and  what  must  come  afterwards.  By  to-morrow,  or 
the  next  day  at  the  latest,  he  would  have  enlisted;  by  six 
months,  at  the  latest,  three  months  if  he  had  what  they 
called  "  luck,"  he  would  be  in  the  trenches,  fighting  and 
killing,  not  because  he  chose,  but  because  he  would  be  told 
to  fight  and  kill.  By  the  simple  act  of  sending  that  letter 
to  his  mother  he  was  committed  to  the  whole  ghastly 
business. 

And  he  funked  it.  There  was  no  use  lying  to  himself 
and  saying  that  he  didn't  funk  it. 

Even  more  than  the  actual  fighting  and  killing,  he 
funked  looking  on  at  fighting  and  killing;  as  for  being 
killed,  he  didn't  think  he  would  really  mind  that  so  much. 
It  would  come  —  it  must  come  —  as  a  relief  from  the 
horrors  he  would  have  to  see  before  it  came.  Nicky  had 
said  that  they  were  unbelievable ;  he  had  seemed  to  think 
you  couldn't  imagine  them  if  you  hadn't  seen  them.  But 
Michael  could.  He  had  only  to  think  of  them  to  see  them 
now.  He  could  make  war-pictures  for  himself,  in  five 
minutes,  every  bit  as  terrifying  as  the  things  they  said 
happened  under  fire.  Any  fool,  if  he  chose  to  think  about 
it,  could  see  what  must  happen.  Only  people  didn't  think. 
They  rushed  into  it  without  seeing  anything;  and  then, 
if  they  were  honest,  they  owned  that  they  funked  it,  before 
and  during  and  afterwards  and  all  the  time. 

Nicky  didn't.  But  that  was  only  because  Nicky  had 
something  that  the  others  hadn't  got;  that  he,  Michael, 
hadn't.  It  was  all  very  well  to  say,  as  he  had  said  last 
night :  "  This  ends  it  "  ;  or,  as  their  phrase  was,  "  Every- 
thing goes  in  now."     It  was  indeed,  as  far  as  he  was  con- 


384  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

cerned,  the  end  of  beauty  and  of  the  making  of  beauty, 
and  of  everything  worth  caring  for;  but  it  was  also  the 
beginning  of  a  life  that  Michael  dreaded  more  than  fight- 
ing and  killing  and  being  killed :  a  life  of  boredom,  of  ob- 
scene ugliness,  of  revolting  contacts,  of  intolerable  sub- 
jection. For  of  course  he  was  going  into  the  ranks  as 
Nicky  had  gone.  And  already  he  could  feel  the  heat  and 
pressure  and  vibration  of  male  bodies  packed  beside  and 
around  him  on  the  floor;  he  could  hear  their  breathing; 
he  could  smell  their  fetid  bedding,  their  dried  sweat. 

Of  course  he  was  going  through  with  it ;  only  —  this 
was  the  thought  his  mind  turned  round  and  round  on  in 
horror  at  itself  —  he  funked  it.  He  funked  it  so  badly 
that  he  would  really  rather  die  than  go  through  with  it. 
When  he  was  actually  killed  that  would  be  his  second 
death;  months  before  it  could  happen  he  would  have 
known  all  about  it;  he  would  have  been  dead  and  buried 
and  alive  again  in  hell. 

What  shocked  Michael  was  his  discovering,  not  that  he 
funked  it  now,  which  was  natural,  almost  permissible,  but 
that  he  had  funked  it  all  the  time.  He  could  see  now 
that,  since  the  War  began,  he  had  been  struggling  to  keep 
out  of  it.  His  mind  had  fought  every  suggestion  that  he 
should  go  in.  It  had  run  to  cover,  like  a  mad,  frightened 
animal  before  the  thoughts  that  hunted  it  down.  Funk, 
pure  funk,  had  been  at  the  bottom  of  all  he  had  said  and 
thought  and  done  since  August,  nineteen-fourteen ;  his  atti- 
tude to  the  War,  his  opinion  of  the  Allies,  and  of  the  Gov- 
ernment and  of  its  conduct  of  the  War,  all  his  wretched 
criticisms  and  disparagements  —  what  had  they  been  but 
the  very  subterfuges  of  funk  ? 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  385 

His  mother  had  known  it;  his  father  had  known  it; 
and  Dorothy  and  John.  It  was  not  conceivable  that 
Nicky  did  not  know  it. 

That  was  what  had  made  the  horror  of  the  empty  space 
that  separated  them. 

Lawrence  Stephen  had  certainly  known  it. 

He  could  not  understand  his  not  knowing  it  himself, 
not  seeing  that  he  struggled.  Yet  he  must  have  seen  that 
Nicky's  death  would  end  it.  Anyhow,  it  was  ended;  if 
not  last  night,  then  this  morning  when  he  posted  the  letter. 

But  he  was  no  longer  appeased  by  this  certainty  of 
his.  He  was  going  out  all  right.  But  merely  going  out 
was  not  enough.  What  counted  was  the  state  of  mind  in 
which  you  went.  Lawrence  had  said,  "  Victory  —  Vic- 
tory is  a  state  of  mind." 

Well  —  it  was  a  state  that  came  naturally  to  Nicky, 
and  did  not  come  naturally  to  him.  It  was  all  very  well 
for  Nicky:  he  had  wanted  to  go.  He  had  gone  out  vic- 
torious before  victory.  Michael  would  go  beaten  before 
defeat. 

He  thought :  "  If  this  is  volunteering,  give  me  com- 
pulsion."    All  the  same  he  was  going. 

All  morning  and  afternoon,  as  he  walked  and  walked, 
his  thoughts  went  the  same  round.  And  in  the  evening 
they  began  again,  but  on  a  new  track.  He  thought :  "  It's 
all  very  well  to  say  I'm  going;  but  how  can  I  go?  "  He 
had  Lawrence  Stephen's  work  to  do ;  Lawrence's  Life  and 
Letters  were  in  his  hands.  How  could  he  possibly  go  and 
leave  Lawrence  dead  and  forgotten?  This  view  seemed 
to  him  to  be  sanity  and  common  sense. 

As  his  mind  darted  up  this  turning  it  was  driven  back. 


386  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

He  saw  Lawrence  Stephen  smiling  at  him  as  he  had  smiled 
at  him  when  Eeveillaud  died.  Lawrence  would  have 
wanted  him  to  go  more  than  anything.  He  would  have 
chosen  to  be  dead  and  forgotten  rather  than  keep  him. 

At  night  these  thoughts  left  him.  He  began  to  think 
of  Nicky  and  of  his  people.  His  father  and  mother  would 
never  be  happy  again.  Nicky  had  been  more  to  them  than 
he  was,  or  even  John.  He  had  been  more  to  Dorothy. 
It  was  hard  on  Dorothy  to  lose  Nicky  and  Drayton  too. 

He  thought  of  Nicky  and  Veronica.  Poor  little  Ronny, 
what  would  she  do  without  Nicky?  He  thought  of 
Veronica,  sitting  silent  in  the  train,  and  looking  at  him 
with  her  startling  look  of  spiritual  maturity.  He  thought 
of  Veronica  singing  to  him  over  and  over  again: 

"  London  Bridge  is  broken  down  — 

"Build  it  up  with  gold  so  fine  — 

"  Build  it  up  with  stones  so  strong  — " 

He  thought  of  Veronica  running  about  the  house  and 
crying,  "Where's  Nicky?     I  want  him." 

Monday  was  like  Sunday,  except  that  he  walked  up 
Karva  Hill  in  the  morning  and  up  Greffington  Edge  in 
the  afternoon,  instead  of  Renton  Moor.  Whichever  way 
he  went  his  thoughts  went  the  same  way  as  yesterday. 
The  images  were,  if  anything,  more  crowded  and  more 
horrible;  but  they  had  lost  their  hold.  He  was  tired  of 
looking  at  them. 

About  five  o'clock  he  turned  abruptly  and  went  back  to 
the  village  the  same  way  by  which  he  came. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  387 

And  as  he  swung  down  the  hill  road  in  sight  of  Renton, 
suddenly  there  was  a  great  clearance  in  his  soul. 

When  he  went  into  the  cottage  he  found  Veronica  there 
waiting  for  him.  She  sat  with  her  hands  lying  in  her 
lap,  and  she  had  the  same  look  he  had  seen  when  she  was 
in  the  train. 

"  Ronny  —  " 

She  stood  up  to  greet  him,  as  if  it  had  been  she  who 
was  staying  there  and  he  who  had  incredibly  arrived. 

"  They  told  me  you  wouldn't  be  long,"  she  said. 

"  I  ?  You  haven't  come  because  you  were  ill  or  any- 
thing ?  " 

She  smiled  and  shook  her  head.  "  No.  Not  for  any- 
thing like  that." 

"  I  didn't  write,  Ronny.     I  couldn't." 

"  I  know."  Their  eyes  met,  measuring  each  other's 
grief.  "  That's  why  I  came.  I  couldn't  bear  to  leave 
you  to  it." 

"  I'd  have  come  before,  Michael,  if  you'd  wanted  me." 

They  were  sitting  together  now,  on  the  settle  by  the 
hearth-place. 

"  I  can't  understand  your  being  able  to  think  of  me," 
he  said. 

"  Because  of  Nicky  ?  If  I  haven't  got  Nicky  it's  all 
the  more  reason  why  I  should  think  of  his  people." 

He  looked  up.  "  I  say  —  how  are  they  ?  Mother  and 
Father?" 

"  They're  very  brave. 

"  It's  worse  for  them  than  it  is  for  me,"  she  said. 
"  What  they  can't  bear  is  your  going." 


388  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  Mother  got  my  letter,  then  ?  " 

"  Yes.     This  morning." 

"  What  did  she  say  ?  " 

"  She  said :     '  Oh,  no.     Not  Michael.' 

"  It  was  a  good  thing  you  wrote,  though.  Your  letter 
made  her  cry.  It  made  even  Dorothy  cry.  They  hadn't 
been  able  to,  before." 

"  I  should  have  thought  if  they  could  stand  Nicky's 
going  —  " 

"  That  was  different.     They  know  it  was  different." 

"  Do  you  suppose  /  don't  know  how  different  it  was  ? 
They  mean  I  funked  it  and  Nicky  didn't." 

"  They  mean  that  Nicky  got  what  he  wanted  when  he 
went,  and  that  there  was  nothing  else  he  could  have  done 
so  well,  except  flying,  or  engineering." 

"  It  comes  to  the  same  thing,  Nicky  simply  wasn't 
afraid." 

"  Yes,  Michael,  he  was  afraid." 

"What  of?" 

"  He  was  most  awfully  afraid  of  seeing  suffering." 

"  Well,  so  am  I.  And  I'm  afraid  of  suffering  myself 
too.  I'm  afraid  of  the  whole  blessed  thing  from  beginning 
to  end." 

"  That's  because  you  keep  on  seeing  the  whole  blessed 
thing  from  beginning  to  end.  Nicky  only  saw  little  bits 
of  it.  The  bits  he  liked.  Machine-guns  working  beauti- 
fully, and  shells  dropping  in  the  right  places,  and  trenches 
being  taken. 

"  And  then,  remember  —  Nicky  hadn't  so  much  to  give 
up." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  389 

"  He  had  you." 

"  Oh,  no.     He  knew  that  was  the  way  to  keep  me." 

"  Ronny  —  if  Nicky  had  been  like  me  could  he  have 
kept  you  %  " 

She  considered  it. 

"  Yes  —  if  he  could  have  been  himself  too." 

"  He  couldn't,  you  see.  He  never  could  have  felt  like 
that." 

"  I  don't  say  he  could." 

"  Well  —  the  awful  thing  is  '  feeling  like  that.'  " 

"  And  the  magnificent  thing  is  '  feeling  like  that,'  and 
going  all  the  same.  Everybody  knows  that  but  you, 
Michael." 

"  Yes,"  he  said.  "  I'm  going.  But  I'm  not  going  to 
lie  about  it  and  say  I  don't  funk  it.     Because  I  do." 

"  You  don't  really/' 

"  I  own  I  didn't  the  first  night  —  the  night  I  knew 
Nicky  was  killed.  Because  I  couldn't  think  of  anything 
else  but  Nicky. 

"  It  was  after  I'd  written  to  Mother  that  it  came  on. 
Because  I  knew  then  I  couldn't  back  out  of  it.  That's 
what  I  can't  get  over  —  my  having  to  do  that  —  to  clinch 
it  —  because  I  was  afraid." 

"  My  dear,  my  dear,  thousands  of  men  do  that  every 
day  for  the  same  reason,  only  they  don't  find  themselves 
out;  and  if  they  did  they  wouldn't  care.  You're  finding 
yourself  out  all  the  time,  and  killing  yourself  with  car- 
ing." 

"  Of  course  I  care.  Can't  you  see  it  proves  that  I  never 
meant  to  go  at  all  ?  " 


390  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  It  proves  that  you  knew  you'd  have  to  go  through 
hell  first  and  you  were  determined  that  even  hell  shouldn't 
keep  you  back." 

"  Ronny  —  that's  what  it  has  been.  Simply  hell.  It's 
been  inconceivable.  Nothing  —  absolutely  nothing  out 
there  could  be  as  bad.  It  went  on  all  yesterday  and  to-day 
—  till  you  came." 

"  I  know,  Michael.     That's  why  I  came." 

"  To  get  me  out  of  it  ?  " 

"  To  get  you  out  of  it. 

"  It's  all  over,"  she  said. 

"  It  may  come  back  —  out  there." 

"  It  won't.  Out  there  you'll  be  happy.  I  saw  Nicky 
on  Sunday  —  the  minute  before  he  was  killed,  Michael. 
And  he  was  happy." 

"  He  would  be."     He  was  silent  for  a  long  time. 

"  Eonny.     Did  Nicky  know  I  funked  it  ?  " 

"  Never !  He  knew  you  wouldn't  keep  out.  All  he 
minded  was  your  missing  any  of  it." 

She  got  up  and  put  on  her  hat.  "  I  must  go.  It's  get- 
ting late.  Will  you  walk  up  to  Morfe  with  me?  I'm 
sleeping  there.     In  the  hotel." 

"  No,  I  say  —  I'm  not  going  to  let  you  turn  out  for 
me.     I'll  sleep  at  the  hotel." 

She  smiled  at  him  with  a  sort  of  wonder,  as  if  she 
thought :  "  Has  he  forgotten,  so  soon  ?  "  And  he  re- 
membered. 

"  I  can't  stop  here,"  she  said.  "  That  would  be  more 
than  even  I  can  bear." 

He  thought :  "  She's  gone  through  hell  herself,  to  get 
me  out  of  it." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  391 

May,  1916. 
B.  E.  F.,  France. 

My  dearest  Mother  and  Father, —  Yes,  "  Captain," 
please.  (I  can  hardly  believe  it  myself,  but  it  is  so.) 
It  was  thundering  good  luck  getting  into  dear  old  Nicky's 
regiment.  The  whole  thing's  incredible.  But  promo- 
tion's nothing.  Everybody's  getting  it  like  lightning 
now.     You're  no  sooner  striped  than  you're  starred. 

I'm  glad  I  resisted  the  Adjutant  and  worked  up  from 
the  ranks.  I  own  it  was  a  bit  beastly  at  the  time  —  quite 
as  beastly  as  Nicky  said  it  would  be;  but  it  was  worth 
while  going  through  with  it,  especially  living  in  the 
trenches  as  a  Tommy.  There's  nothing  like  it  for  mak- 
ing you  know  your  men.  You  can  tell  exactly  what's 
going  to  bother  them,  and  what  isn't.  You've  got  your 
finger  on  the  pulse  of  their  morale  —  not  that  it's  jumpier 
than  yours ;  it  isn't  —  and  their  knowing  that  they 
haven't  got  to  stand  anything  that  you  haven't  stood  gives 
you  no  end  of  a  pull.  Honestly,  I  don't  believe  I  could 
have  faced  them  if  it  wasn't  for  that.  So  that  your 
morale's  the  better  for  it  as  well  as  theirs.  You  know,  if 
you're  shot  down  this  minute  it  won't  matter.  The  weed- 
iest Tommy  in  your  Company  can  "  carry  on." 

We're  a  funny  crowd  in  my  billet  —  all  risen  from  the 
ranks  except  my  Senior.  John  would  love  us.  There's 
a  chap  who  writes  short  stories  and  goes  out  very  earnestly 
among  the  corpses  to  find  copy;  and  there's  another  who 
was  in  the  publishing  business  and  harks  back  to  it,  now 
and  then,  in  a  dreamy  nostalgic  way,  and  rather  as  if  he 
wanted  to  rub  it  into  us  writing  chaps  what  he  could  do 
for  us,  only  he  wouldn't;  and  there's  a  tailor  who  swears 
he  could  tell  a  mile  off  where  my  tunic  came  from ;  and  a 
lawyer's  clerk  who  sticks  his  cigarette  behind  his  ear. 
(We  used  to  wonder  what  he'd  do  with  his  revolver  till 
we  saw  what  he  did  with  it.)  They  all  love  thinking  of 
what  they've  been  and  telling  you  about  it.  I  almost  wish 
I'd  gone  into  Daddy's  business.     Then  perhaps  I'd  know 


392  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

what  it  feels  like  to  go  straight  out  of  a  shop  or  an  office 
iuto  the  most  glorious  Army  in  history. 

I  forgot  the  Jew  pawnbroker  —  at  least  we  think  he's  a 
pawnbroker  —  who's  always  inventing  things ;  stupen- 
dous and  impossible  things.  His  last  idea  was  machine- 
howitzers  fourteen  feet  high,  that  take  in  shells  exactly  as 
a  machine-gun  takes  in  bullets.  He  says  "  You'll  see 
them  in  the  next  War."  When  you  ask  him  how  he's  go- 
ing to  transport  and  emplace  and  hide  his  machine- 
howitzers,  he  looks  dejected,  and  says  "  I  never  thought 
of  that"  and  has  another  idea  at  once,  even  more  im- 
possible. 

That  reminds  me.  I've  seen  the  "  Tanks  "  (Nicky's 
Moving  Fortresses)  in  action.  I'd  give  my  promotion  if 
only  he  could  have  seen  them  too.  We  mustn't  call  them 
Fortresses  any  more  —  they're  most  violently  for  attack. 
As  far  as  I  can  make  out  Nicky's  and  Drayton's  thing 
was  something  between  these  and  the  French  ones ;  other- 
wise one  might  have  wondered  whether  their  plans  and 
models  really  did  go  where  John  says  they  did !  I  wish 
I  could  believe  that  Nicky  and  Drayton  really  had  had  a 
hand  in  it. 

I'm  most  awfully  grieved  to  hear  that  young  Vereker's 
reported  missing.  Do  you  remember  how  excited  he 
used  to  be  dashing  about  the  lawn  at  tennis,  and  how 
Alice  Lathom  used  to  sit  and  look  at  him,  and  jump  if 
you  brought  her  her  tea  too  suddenly?  Let's  hope  we'll 
have  finished  up  this  damned  War  before  they  get  little 
Norris. 

Love  to  Dorothy  and  Don  and  Ronny. —  Your  loving, 

Mick. 

When  Frances  read  that  letter  she  said,  "  I  wonder 
if  he  really  is  all  right.  He  says  very  little  about  him- 
self." 

And  Anthony  said,  "  Then  you  may  be  sure  he  is." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  393 

May  31st,  1916. 
B.  E.  F.,  Feance. 

My  dear  Ronny, —  I'm  glad  Mummy  and  Father  have 
got  all  my  letters.  They  won't  mind  my  writing  to  you 
this  time.  It  really  is  your  turn  now.  Thanks  for  Wad- 
ham's  "Poems"  (I  wish  they'd  been  Ellis's).  It's  a 
shame  to  laugh  at  Waddy  —  but  —  he  has  spread  himself 
over  Flanders,  hasn't  he?  Like  the  inundations  round 
Ypres. 

I'm  most  awfully  touched  at  Dad  and  Mummy  wanting 
to  publish  mine.  Here  they  all  are  —  just  as  I  wrote 
them,  in  our  billet,  at  night  or  in  the  early  morning,  when 
the  others  were  sleeping  and  I  wasn't.  I  don't  know 
whether  they're  bad  or  good ;  I  haven't  had  time  to  think 
about  them.  It  all  seems  so  incredibly  far  away.  Even 
last  week  seems  far  away.     You  go  on  so  fast  here. 

I'd  like  Ellis  and  Monier-Owen  to  see  them  and  to  weed 
out  the  bad  ones.  But  you  mustn't  ask  them  to  do  any- 
thing. They  haven't  time,  either.  I  think  you  and 
Dorothy  and  Dad  will  manage  it  all  right  among  you. 
If  you  don't  I  shan't  much  care. 

Of  course  I'm  glad  that  they've  taken  you  on  at  the 
Hampstead  Hospital,  if  it  makes  you  happier  to  nurse. 
And  I'm  glad  Dad  put  his  foot  down  on  your  going  to 
Vera.  She  gave  you  up  to  my  people  and  she  can't  take 
you  back  now.     I'm  sorry  for  her  though ;  so  is  he. 

Have  I  had  any  adventures  "  by  myself  "  ?  Only  two. 
(I've  given  up  what  Mother  calls  my  "  not  wanting  to  go 
to  the  party.")  One  came  off  in  "  No  Man's  Land  "  the 
other  night.  I  went  out  with  a  "  party  "  and  came  back 
by  myself  —  unless  you  count  a  damaged  Tommy  hang- 
ing on  to  me.  It  began  in  pleasurable  excitement  and 
ended  in  some  perturbation,  for  I  had  to  get  him  in  un- 
der cover  somehow,  and  my  responsibility  weighed  on 
me  —  so  did  he.  The  other  was  ages  ago  in  a  German 
trench.  I  was  by  myself,  because  I'd  gone  in  too  quick, 
and  the  "  party  "  behind  me  took  the  wrong  turning.     I 


394  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

did  manage  to  squeeze  a  chilly  excitement  out  of  going 
on  alone.  Then  I  bumped  up  against  a  fat  German  offi- 
cer and  his  revolver.  That  really  was  an  exquisite  mo- 
ment, and  I  was  beast  enough  to  be  glad  I  had  it  all  to 
myself.  It  meant  a  bag  of  fifteen  prisoners  —  all  my 
own.  But  that  was  nothing;  they'd  have  surrendered  to 
a  mouse.  There  was  no  reason  why  they  shouldn't,  be- 
cause I'd  fired  first  and  there  was  no  more  officer  to  play 
up  to. 

But  the  things  you  don't  do  by  yourself  are  a  long  way 
the  best.  Nothing  —  not  even  poetry  —  can  beat  an  in- 
fantry charge  when  you're  leading  it.  That's  because  of 
your  men.  It  feels  as  if  you  were  drawing  them  all  up 
after  you.  Of  course  you  aren't.  They're  coming  on 
their  own,  and  you're  simply  nothing,  only  a  little  unim- 
portant part  of  them  —  even  when  you're  feeling  as  if 
you  were  God  Almighty. 

I'm  afraid  it  does  look  awfully  as  if  young  Vereker 
were  killed.  They  may  hear,  you  know,  in  some  round- 
about way  —  through  the  Red  Cross,  or  some  of  his  men. 
I've  written  to  them. 

Love  to  everybody.  Certainly  you  may  kiss  Nanna 
for  me,  if  she'd  like  it.  I  wish  I  liked  Waddy  more  — 
when  you've  given  him  to  me. — Always  your  affection- 
ate, 

Michael. 

P.S. —  I  don't  sound  pleased  about  the  publication ;  but 
I  am.  I  can't  get  over  their  wanting  to  do  it.  I  thought 
they  didn't  care. 

Ronny  —  I've  been  such  a  beast  to  them  —  when 
Father  tried  to  read  my  stuff  —  bless  him  !  —  and  couldn't, 
I  used  to  wish  to  God  he'd  leave  it  alone.  And  now  I'd 
give  anything  to  see  liis  dear  old  paws  hanging  on  to  it 
and  twitching  with  fright,  and  his  eyes  slewing  round  to 
see  if  I'm  looking  at  him. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  395 

June  lJ+th,  1916. 
B.  E.  F.,  France. 

My  dear  Ronny, —  I'm  glad  you  like  them,  and  I'm 
glad  Father  thinks  he  "  understands  Michael's  poems " 
this  time,  and  I'm  glad  they've  made  Mother  and  Dorothy 
feel  happier  about  me  —  BUT  —  they  must  get  it  out  of 
their  heads  that  they're  my  "  message,"  or  any  putrescent 
thing  of  that  sort.  The  bare  idea  of  writing  a  message,  or 
of  being  supposed  to  write  a  message,  makes  me  sick.  I 
know  it's  beastly  of  me,  but,  really  I'd  rather  they  weren't 
published  at  all,  if  there's  the  smallest  chance  of  their 
being  taken  that  way. 

But  if  Ellis  is  doing  the  introduction  there  isn't  the 
smallest  chance.     Thank  God  for  Ellis. 

There  —  I've  let  off  all  my  beastliness. 

And  now  I'll  try  to  answer  your  letter.  Yes;  the 
"  ecstasy  "  in  the  last  two  poems  is  Nicky's  ecstasy.  And 
as  Ellis  says  it  strikes  him  as  absolutely  real,  I  take  it  that 
some  of  Nicky's  "  reality  "  has  got  through.  It's  hard  on 
Ellis  that  he  has  to  take  his  ecstasy  from  me,  instead  of 
coming  out  and  getting  it  for  himself. 

But  you  and  Nicky  and  Lawrence  are  right.  It  is  ab- 
solutely real.  I  mean  it  has  to  do  with  absolute  reality. 
With  God.  It  hasn't  anything  to  do  with  having  courage, 
or  not  having  courage;  it's  another  state  of  mind  alto- 
gether. It  isn't  what  Nicky's  man  said  it  was  —  you're 
not  ashamed  of  it  the  next  day.  It  isn't  excitement; 
you're  not  excited.  It  isn't  a  tingling  of  your  nerves ; 
they  don't  tingle.  It's  all  curiously  quiet  and  steady. 
You  remember  when  you  saw  Nicky  —  how  everything 
stood  still  ?  And  how  two  times  were  going  on,  and  you 
and  Nicky  were  in  one  time,  and  Mother  was  in  the 
other  ?  Well  —  it's  like  that.  Your  body  and  its  nerves 
aren't  in  it  at  all.  Your  body  may  be  moving  violently, 
with  other  bodies  moving  violently  round  it ;  but  you're 
still. 

But  suppose  it  is  your  nerves.     Why  should  they  tingle 


396  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

at  just  that  particular  moment,  the  moment  that  makes 
animals  afraid  ?  Why  should  you  be  so  extraordinarily 
happy  ?  Why  should  the  moment  of  extreme  danger  be 
always  the  "  exquisite  "  moment  ?  Why  not  the  moment 
of  safety? 

Doesn't  it  look  as  if  danger  were  the  point  of  contact 
with  reality,  and  death  the  closest  point  ?  You're  through. 
Actually  you  lay  hold  on  eternal  life,  and  you  know  it. 

Another  thing  —  it  always  comes  with  that  little  shock 
of  recognition.  It's  happened  before,  and  when  you  get 
near  to  it  again  you  know  what  it  is.  You  keep  on  want- 
ing to  get  near  it,  wanting  it  to  happen  again.  You  may 
lose  it  the  next  minute,  but  you  know.  Lawrence  knew 
what  it  was.     Nicky  knew. 


June  19th. 

I'm  coming  back  to  it  —  after  that  interruption  —  be- 
cause I  want  to  get  the  thing  clear.  I  have  to  put  it 
down  as  I  feel  it;  there's  no  other  way.  But  they 
mustn't  think  it's  something  that  only  Lawrence  and 
Nicky  and  I  feel.  The  men  feel  it  too,  even  when  they 
don't  know  what  it  is.     And  some  of  them  do  know. 

Of  course  we  shall  be  accused  of  glorifying  War  and 
telling  lies  about  it.  Well  —  there's  a  Frenchman  who 
has  told  the  truth,  piling  up  all  the  horrors,  faithfully,  re- 
morselessly, magnificently.  But  he  seems  to  think  people 
oughtn't  to  write  about  this  War  at  all  unless  they  show 
up  the  infamy  of  it,  as  a  deterrent,  so  that  no  Govern- 
ment can  ever  start  another  one.  It's  a  sort  of  literary 
"  f rightfulness."  But  who  is  he  trying  to  frighten? 
Does  he  imagine  that  Trance,  or  England,  or  Bussia  or 
Belgium,  or  Serbia,  will  want  to  start  another  war  when 
this  is  over  ?  And  does  he  suppose  that  Germany  —  if 
we  don't  beat  her  —  will  be  deterred  by  his  f rightfulness  ? 
Germany's  arrogance  will  be  satisfied  when  she  knows 
she's  made  a  Frenchman  feel  like  that  about  it. 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  397 

He's  got  his  truth  all  right.  As  Morrie  would  say: 
"  That's  War."  But  a  peaceful  earthquake  can  do  much 
the  same  thing.  And  if  our  truth  —  what  we've  seen  — 
isn't  War,  at  any  rate  it's  what  we've  got  out  of  it,  it's  our 
"  glory,"  our  spiritual  compensation  for  the  physical  tor- 
ture, and  there  would  be  a  sort  of  infamy  in  trying  to 
take  it  from  us.  It  isn't  the  French  Government,  or  the 
British  that's  fighting  Germany ;  it's  we  —  all  of  us.  To 
insist  on  the  world  remembering  nothing  but  these  horrors 
is  as  if  men  up  to  their  knees  in  the  filth  they're  clearing 
away  should  complain  of  each  other  for  standing  in  it  and 
splashing  it  about. 

The  filth  of  War  —  and  the  physical  torture  —  Good 
God!  As  if  the  world  was  likely  to  forget  it.  Any 
more  than  we're  likely  to  forget  what  we  know. 

You  remember  because  you've  known  it  before  and  it 
all  hangs  together.  It's  not  as  if  danger  were  the  only 
point  of  contact  with  reality.  You  get  the  same  ecstasy, 
the  same  shock  of  recognition,  and  the  same  utter  satis- 
faction when  you  see  a  beautiful  thing.  At  least  to  me 
it's  like  that.  You  know  what  Nicky  thought  it  was  like. 
You  know  what  it  was  like  when  you  used  to  sit  looking 
and  looking  at  Mother's  "  tree  of  Heaven." 

It's  odd,  Bonny,  to  have  gone  all  your  life  trying  to 
get  reality,  trying  to  get  new  beauty,  trying  to  get  utter 
satisfaction ;  to  have  funked  coming  out  here  because  you 
thought  it  was  all  obscene  ugliness  and  waste  and  frustra- 
tion, and  then  to  come  out,  and  to  find  what  you  wanted. 


June  25th. 
I  wrote  all  that,  while  I  could,  because  I  want  to  make 
them  see  it.  It's  horrible  that  Dorothy  should  think  that 
Drayton's  dead  and  that  Mother  should  think  that 
Nicky's  dead,  when  they  wouldn't,  if  they  really  knew. 
If  they  don't  believe  Lawrence  or  me,  can't  they  believe 
Nicky?     I'm  only  saying  what  he  said.     But   I   can't 


398  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

write  to  them  about  it  because  they  make  me  shy,  and 
I'm  afraid  they'll  think  I'm  only  gassing,  or  "  making 
poetry  " —  as  if  poetry  wasn't  the  most  real  thing  there  is ! 
Tf  anybody  can  make  them  see  it,  you  can. —  Always 
your  affectionate, 

Michael. 


XXV 

Anthony  was  going  into  the  house  to  take  back  the  key 
of  the  workshop. 

He  had  locked  the  door  of  the  workshop  a  year  ago, 
after  Nicky's  death,  and  had  not  opened  it  again  until  to- 
day. This  afternoon  in  the  orchard  he  had  seen  that  the 
props  of  the  old  apple-tree  were  broken  and  he  had  thought 
that  he  would  like  to  make  new  ones,  and  the  wood  was  in 
the  workshop. 

Everything  in  there  was  as  it  had  been  when  Nicky 
finished  with  his  Moving  Fortress.  The  brass  and  steel 
filings  lay  in  a  heap  under  the  lathe,  the  handle  was  tilted 
at  the  point  where  he  had  left  it;  pits  in  the  saw-dust 
showed  where  his  feet  had  stood.  His  overalls  hung  over 
the  bench  where  he  had  slipped  them  off. 

Anthony  had  sat  down  on  the  bench  and  had  looked  at 
these  things  with  remembrance  and  foreboding.  He 
thought  of  Nicky  and  of  Nicky's  pleasure  and  excite- 
ment over  the  unpacking  of  his  first  lathe  —  the  one  he 
had  begged  for  for  his  birthday  —  and  of  his  own  pleasure 
and  excitement  as  he  watched  his  boy  handling  it  and 
showing  him  so  cleverly  how  it  worked.  It  stood  there 
still  in  the  corner.  Nicky  had  given  it  to  Veronica.  He 
had  taught  her  how  to  use  it.  And  Anthony  thought  of 
Veronica  when  she  was  little;  he  saw  Nicky  taking  care 
of  her,  teaching  her  to  run  and  ride  and  play  games. 

399 


400  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

And  he  remembered  what  Veronica's  mother  had  said  to 
him  and  Frances:  "Wait  till  Nicky  has  children  of  his 
own." 

He  thought  of  John.  John  had  volunteered  three  times 
and  had  been  three  times  rejected.  And  now  conscrip- 
tion had  got  him.  He  had  to  appear  before  the  Board  of 
Examiners  that  afternoon.  He  might  be  rejected  again. 
But  the  standard  was  not  so  exacting  as  it  had  been  — 
John  might  be  taken. 

He  thought  of  his  business  —  John's  business  and  his, 
and  Bartie's.  Those  big  Government  contracts  had  more 
than  saved  them.  They  were  making  tons  of  money  out 
of  the  War.  Even  when  the  Government  cut  down  their 
profits ;  even  when  they  had  given  more  than  half  they 
made  to  the  War  funds,  the  fact  remained  that  they  were 
living  on  the  War.  Bartie,  without  a  wife  or  children, 
was  appallingly  rich. 

If  John  were  taken.     If  John  were  killed  — 

If  Michael  died  — 

Michael  had  been  reported  seriously  wounded. 

He  had  thought  then  of  Michael.  And  he  had  not  been 
able  to  bear  thinking  any  more.  He  had  got  up  and  left 
the  workshop,  locking  the  door  behind  him,  forgetting  what 
he  had  gone  in  for ;  and  he  had  taken  the  key  back  to  the 
house.  He  kept  it  in  what  his  children  used  to  call  the 
secret  drawer  of  his  bureau.  It  lay  there  with  Nicky's 
last  letter  of  June,  1915,  and  a  slab  of  coromandel  wood. 

It  was  when  he  was  going  into  the  house  with  the  key 
that  John  met  him. 

"  Have  they  taken  you  ?  n 

"  Yes." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  401 

John's  face  was  hard  and  white.  They  went  together 
into  Anthony's  room. 

"  It's  what  you  wanted,"  Anthony  said. 

"  Of  course  it's  what  I  wanted.  I  want  it  more  than 
ever  now. 

"  The  wire's  come,  Father.     Mother  opened  it." 

It  was  five  days  now  since  they  had  heard  that  Michael 
had  died  of  his  wounds.  Frances  was  in  Michael's  room. 
She  was  waiting  for  Dorothea  and  Veronica  to  help  her 
to  find  his  papers.  It  was  eight  o'clock  in  the  evening, 
and  they  had  to  be  sorted  and  laid  out  ready  for  Morton 
Ellis  to  look  over  them  to-morrow.  To-morrow  Morton 
Ellis  would  come,  and  he  would  take  them  away. 

The  doors  of  Michael's  and  of  Nicky's  rooms  were  al- 
ways kept  shut;  Frances  knew  that,  if  she  were  to  open 
the  door  on  the  other  side  of  the  corridor  and  look  in, 
every  thing  in  Nicky's  room  would  welcome  her  with  ten- 
derness even  while  it  inflicted  its  unique  and  separate 
wound.  But  Michael's  room  was  bare  and  silent.  He 
had  cleared  everything  away  out  of  her  sight  last  year 
before  he  went.  The  very  books  on  the  shelves  repudiated 
her ;  reminded  her  that  she  had  never  understood  him,  that 
he  had  always  escaped  her.  His  room  kept  his  secret, 
and  she  felt  afraid  and  abashed  in  it,  knowing  herself 
an  intruder.  Presently  all  that  was  most  precious  in  it 
would  be  taken  from  her  and  given  over  to  a  stranger 
whom  he  had  never  liked. 

Her  mind  turned  and  fastened  on  one  object  —  the 
stiff,  naked  wooden  chair  standing  in  its  place  before  the 
oak  table  by  the  window.     She  remembered  how  she  had 


402  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

come  to  Michael  there  and  found  him  writing  at  his  table, 
and  how  she  had  talked  to  him  as  though  he  had  been  a 
shirker  and  a  coward. 

She  had  borne  Nicky's  death.  But  she  could  not  bear 
Michael's.  She  stood  there  in  his  room,  staring,  hypno- 
tized by  her  memory.  She  heard  Dorothea  come  in  and 
go  out  again.     And  then  Veronica  came  in. 

She  turned  to  Veronica  to  help  her. 

She  clung  to  Veronica  and  was  jealous  of  her.  Veron- 
ica had  not  come  between  her  and  Nicky  as  long  as  he 
was  alive,  but  now  that  he  was  dead  she  came  between 
them.  She  came  between  her  and  Michael  too.  Mi- 
chael's mind  had  always  been  beyond  her;  she  could  only 
reach  it  through  Veronica  and  through  Veronica's  secret. 
Her  mind  clutched  at  Veronica's  secret,  and  flung  it  away 
as  useless,  and  returned,  clutching  at  it  again. 

It  was  as  if  Veronica  held  the  souls  of  Michael  and 
Nicholas  in  her  hands.  She  offered  her  the  souls  of  her 
dead  sons.  She  was  the  mediator  between  her  and  their 
souls. 

"  I  could  bear  it,  Veronica,  if  I  hadn't  made  him  go. 
I  came  to  him,  here,  in  this  room,  and  bullied  him  till 
he  went.  I  said  horrible  things  to  him  —  that  he  must 
have  remembered. 

"  He  wasn't  like  Nicky  —  it  was  infinitely  worse  for 
him.  And  I  was  cruel  to  him.  I  had  no  pity.  I  drove 
him  out  —  to  be  killed. 

"  And  I  simply  cannot  bear  it." 

"  But  —  he  didn't  go  then.  He  waited  till  —  till  he 
was  free.  If  anybody  could  have  made  him,  Nicky  could. 
But  it  wasn't  even  Nicky.     It  was  himself," 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  403 

"  If  he'd  been  killed  at  Nicky  was  —  but  to  die  like 
that,  in  hospital  —  of  those  horrible  wounds." 

"  He  was  leading  a  charge,  just  as  Nicky  was.  And 
you  know  he  was  happy,  just  as  Nicky  was.  Every  line 
he's  written  shows  that  he  was  happy." 

"  It  only  shows  that  they  were  both  full  of  life,  that 
they  loved  their  life  and  wanted  to  live. 

"  It's  no  use,  Konny,  you're  saying  you  know  they're 
there.  I  don't.  I'd  give  anything  to  believe  it.  And 
yet  it  wouldn't  be  a  bit  of  good  if  I  did.  I  don't 
want  them  all  changed  into  something  spiritual  that  I 
shouldn't  know  if  it  was  there.  I  want  their  bodies 
with  me  just  as  they  used  to  be.  I  want  to  hear  them 
and  touch  them,  and  see  them  come  in  in  their  old 
clothes. 

"  To  see  Nicky  standing  on  the  hearthrug  with  Timmy 
in  his  arms.  I  want  things  like  that,  Konny.  Even  if 
you're  right,  it's  all  clean  gone." 

Her  lips  tightened. 

"  I'm  talking  as  if  I  was  the  only  one.  But  I  know 
it's  worse  for  you,  Ronny.  I  had  them  all  those  years. 
And  I've  got  Anthony.  You've  had  nothing  but  your  poor 
three  days." 

Veronica  thought :  "  How  can  I  tell  her  that  I've  got 
more  than  she  thinks  ?  It's  awful  that  I  should  have  what 
she  hasn't."  She  was  ashamed  and  beaten  before  this 
irreparable,  mortal  grief. 

"  And  it's  worse,"  Frances  said,  "  for  the  wretched 
mothers  whose  sons  haven't  fought." 

For  her  pride  rose  in  her  again  —  the  pride  that  up- 
lifted her  supernaturally  when  Nicky  died. 


404  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  You  mustn't  think  I  grudge  them.  I  don't.  I  don't 
even  grudge  John." 

The  silence  of  Michael's  room  sank  into  them,  it  weighed 
on  their  hearts  and  they  were  afraid  of  each  other's  voices. 
Frances  was  glad  when  Dorothy  came  and  they  could  be- 
gin their  work  there. 

But  Michael  had  not  left  them  much  to  do.  They 
found  his  papers  all  in  one  drawer  of  his  writing-table, 
sorted  and  packed  and  labelled,  ready  for  Morton  Ellis 
to  take  away.  One  sealed  envelope  lay  in  a  place  by 
itself.  Frances  thought :  "  He  didn't  want  any  of  us 
to  touch  his  things." 

Then  she  saw  Veronica's  name  on  the  sealed  envelope. 
She  was  glad  when  Veronica  left  them  and  went  to  her 
hospital. 

And  when  she  was  gone  she  wanted  her  back  again. 

"  I  wish  I  hadn't  spoken  that  way  to  Veronica,"  she 
said. 

"  She  won't  mind.     She  knows  you  couldn't  help  it." 

"  I  could,  Dorothy,  if  I  wasn't  jealous  of  her.  I  mean 
I'm  jealous  of  her  certainty.  If  I  had  it,  too,  I  shouldn't 
be  jealous." 

"  She  wants  you  to  have  it.     She's  trying  to  give  it  you. 

"  Mother  —  how  do  we  know  she  isn't  right  ?  Nicky 
said  she  was.     And  Michael  said  Nicky  was  right. 

"  If  it  had  been  only  Nicky  —  he  might  have  got  it  from 
Veronica.  But  Michael  never  got  things  from  anybody. 
And  you  do  know  things  in  queer  ways.  Even  I  do.  At 
least  I  did  once  —  when  I  was  in  prison.  I  knew  some- 
thing tremendous  was  going  to  happen.  I  saw  it,  or  felt 
it7  or  something.     I  won't  swear  I  knew  it  was  the  War, 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  405 

I  don't  suppose  I  did.  But  I  knew  Frank  was  all  mixed 
up  with  it.  And  it  was  the  most  awfully  real  thing.  You 
couldn't  go  back  on  it,  or  get  behind  it.  It  was  as  if  I'd 
seen  that  he  and  Lawrence  and  Nicky  and  Michael  and 
all  of  them  would  die  in  it  to  save  the  whole  world.  Like 
Christ,  only  that  they  really  did  die  and  the  whole  world 
was  saved.     There  was  nothing  futile  about  it." 

"Well  —  ?" 

"  Well,  they  might  see  their  real  thing  the  same  way  — 
in  a  flash.  Aren't  they  a  thousand  times  more  likely  to 
know  than  we  are  ?  What  right  have  we  —  sitting  here 
safe  —  to  say  it  isn't  when  they  say  it  is  ?  " 

"  But  —  if  there's  anything  in  it  —  why  can't  I  see 
it  as  well  as  you  and  Veronica?  After  all,  I'm  their 
mother." 

"  Perhaps  that's  why  it  takes  you  longer,  Mummy. 
You  think  of  their  bodies  more  than  we  do,  because  they 
were  part  of  your  body.  Their  souls,  or  whatever  it  is, 
aren't  as  real  to  you  just  at  first." 

"  I  see,'  said  Frances,  bitterly.  "  You've  only  got  to 
be  a  mother,  and  give  your  children  your  flesh  and  blood, 
to  be  sure  of  their  souls  going  from  you  and  somebody  else 
getting  them." 

"  That's  the  price  you  pay  for  being  mothers." 

ft  Was  Frank's  soul  ever  more  real  to  you,  Dorothy  ?  " 

"  Yes.  It  was  once  —  for  just  one  minute.  The  night 
he  went  away.  That's  another  queer  thing  that  hap- 
pened." 

"  It  didn't  satisfy  you,  darling,  did  it  ?  " 

"  Of  course  it  didn't  satisfy  me.  I  want  more  and 
more  of  it.     Not  just  flashes," 


406  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

"  You  say  it's  the  price  we  pay  for  being  mothers.  Yet 
if  Veronica  had  had  a  child  —  " 

"  You  needn't  be  so  sorry  for  Veronica." 

"  I'm  not.  It's  you  I'm  sorriest  for.  You've  had 
nothing.     From  beginning  to  end  you  had  nothing. 

"  I  might  at  least  have  seen  that  you  had  it  in  the  be- 
ginning." 

"  You,  Mummy  ?  " 

"  Yes.  Me.  You  shall  have  it  now.  Unless  you  want 
to  leave  me." 

"  I  wouldn't  leave  you  for  the  world,  Mummy  ducky. 
Only  you  must  let  me  work  always  and  all  the  time." 

"  Let  you  ?     I'll  let  you  do  what  you  like,  my  dear." 

"  You  always  have  let  me,  haven't  you  %  " 

"  It  was  the  least  I  could  do." 

"  Poor  Mummy,  did  you  think  you  had  to  make  up 
because  you  cared  for  them  more  than  me  ?  " 

"  I  wonder,"  said  Frances,  thoughtfully,  "  if  I  did." 

"  Of  course.     Of  course  you  did.     Who  wouldn't  ?  " 

"  I  never  meant  you  to  know  it,  Dorothy." 

"  Of  course  I  knew  it.  I  must  have  known  it  ever  since 
Michael  was  born.  I  knew  you  couldn't  help  it.  You 
had  to.  Even  when  I  was  a  tiresome  kid  I  knew  you  had 
to.     It  was  natural." 

"  Natural  or  unnatural,  many  girls  have  hated  their 
mothers  for  less.     You've  been  very  big  and  generous. 

"  Perhaps  —  if  you'd  been  little  and  weak  —  but  you 
were  always  such  an  independent  thing.  I  used  to  think 
you  didn't  want  me." 

"  I  wanted  you  a  lot  more  than  you  thought.  But,  you 
see,  I've  learned  to  do  without." 


THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN  407 

She  thought :  "  It's  better  she  should  have  it 
straight." 

"  If  you'd  think  less  about  me,  Mother,"  she  said,  "  and 
more  about  Father  —  " 

"Father?" 

"  Yes.  Father  isn't  independent  —  though  he  looks 
it.  He  wants  you  awfully.  He  always  has  wanted  you. 
And  he  hasn't  learned  to  do  without." 

"  Where  is  he  ?  " 

"  He's  sitting  out  there  in  the  garden,  all  by  himself, 
in  the  dark,  under  the  tree." 

Frances  went  to  him  there. 

"  I  wondered  whether  you  would  come  to  me,"  he  said. 

"  I  was  doing  something  for  Michael." 

"Is  it  done?" 

"  Yes.     It's  done." 

Five  months  passed.     It  was  November  now. 

In  the  lane  by  the  side  door,  Anthony  was  waiting  in 
his  car.  Rain  was  falling,  hanging  from  the  trees  and 
falling.     Every  now  and  then  he  looked  at  his  watch. 

He  had  still  a  quarter  of  an  hour  before  he  need  start. 
But  he  was  not  going  back  into  the  house.  They  were  all 
in  there  saying  good-bye  to  John :  old  Mrs.  Fleming,  and 
Louie  and  Emmeline  and  Edith.  And  Maurice.  And 
his  brother  Bartie. 

The  door  in  the  garden  wall  opened  and  they  came  out : 
the  four  women  in  black  —  the  black  they  still  wore  for 
Michael  —  and  the  two  men. 

They  all  walked  slowly  up  the  lane.  Anthony  could 
see  Bartie's  shoulders  hunched  irritably  against  the  rain. 


4o8  THE  TREE  OF  HEAVEN 

He  could  see  Morrie  carrying  his  sodden,  quivering  body 
with  care  and  an  exaggerated  sobriety.  He  saw  Grannie, 
going  slowly,  under  the  umbrella,  very  upright  and  con- 
scious of  herself  as  wonderful  and  outlasting. 

He  got  down  and  cranked  up  his  engine. 

Then  he  sat  sternly  in  his  car  and  waited,  with  his  hands 
on  the  steering-wheel,  ready. 

The  engine  throbbed,  impatient  for  the  start. 

John  came  out  very  quickly  and  took  his  seat  beside 
his  father.  And  the  car  went  slowly  towards  the  high 
road. 

Uncle  Morrie  stood  waiting  for  it  by  the  gate  at  the  top 
of  the  lane.  As  it  passed  through  he  straightened  himself 
and  put  up  his  hands  in  a  crapulous  salute. 

The  young  man  smiled  at  him,  saluted,  and  was  gone. 


THE    END 


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"...  All  of  which  show  the  same  sensitive  apprehension  of  un- 
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"...  All  these  stories  are  of  deep  interest  because  all  of  them 
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"The  Three  Sisters"  reveals  her  at  her  best  It  is  a  story  of  temperament, 
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ability."—  Outlook. 

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"The  reader  follows  with  breathless  interest  the  narrative  of  his 
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But  the  questions  are  so  frankly  what  any  one  of  us  may  be  asking 
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the  reader  follows  with  absorbed  interest  the  Bishop's  inner  strug- 
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By  ALICE  CHOLMONDELEY 

Aut  Cloth,  i2mo.,  $1.25 

.  book  which  is  true  in  essentials — so  real  that  one  is  tempted  to 
lbt  whether  it  is  fiction  at  all — doubly  welcome  and  doubly  impor- 
<tnt.  ...  It  would  be  difficult  indeed  to  find  a  book  in  which  the 
state  of  mind  of  the  German  people  is  pictured  so  cleverly,  with  so 
much  understanding  and  convincing  detail.  .  .  .  Intelligent,  gener- 
ous, sweet-natured,  broadminded,  quick  to  see  and  to  appreciate  all 
that  is  beautiful  either  in  nature  or  in  art,  rejoicing  humbly  over 
her  own  great  gift,  endowed  with  a  keen  sense  of  humour,  Chris- 
tine's is  a  thoroughly  wholesome  and  lovable  character.  But 
charming  as  Christine's  personality  and  her  literary  style  both  are, 
the  main  value  of  the  book  lies  in  its  admirably  lucid  analysis  of 
the  German  mind." — New  York  Times. 

"Absolutely  different  from  preceding  books  of  the  war.  Its  very 
freedom  and  girlishness  of  expression,  its  very  simplicity  and  open- 
heartedness,  prove  the  truth  of  its  pictures." — New  York  World. 

"A  luminous  story  of  a  sensitive  and  generous  nature,  the  spon- 
taneous expression  of  one  spirited,  affectionate,  ardently  ambitious, 
and  blessed  with  a  sense  of  humour." — Boston  Herald. 

"The  next  time  some  sentimental  old  lady  of  either  sex,  who 
'can't  see  why  we  have  to  send  our  boys  abroad,'  comes  into  your 
vision,  and  you  know  they  are  too  unintelligent  (they  usually  are) 
to  understand  a  serious  essay,  try  to  trap  them  into  reading  'Chris- 
tine.' If  you  succeed  we  know  it  will  do  them  good." — Town  and 
Country. 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

Publishers     64-66  Fifth  Avenue     New  York 


The  Dwelling  Place  of  Light 

By  WINSTON  CHURCHILL 

Author  of  "The  Inside  of  the  Cup,"  "Richard  Carvel,"  etc. 
With  frontispiece  by  Arthur  I.  Keller. 

Cloth,  i2mo.,  $1.60 

"One  of  the  most  absorbing  and  fascinating  romances, 
and  one  of  the  most  finished  masterpieces  of  serious  literary- 
art  which  have  appeared  in  this  year  or  in  this  century." — 
New  York  Tribune. 

"It  is  a  powerful  story,  wonderfully  told,  the  gifted  author 
has  succeeded  in  gripping  the  reader's  attention  and  in 
holding  his  interest  to  the  very  last.  .  .  .  Janet  is  a  charac- 
ter that  will  live,  for  there  are  thousands  of  young  women 
who  will  recognize  in  her  some  phase  of  their  own  experi- 
ence and  some  of  their  own  aspirations." — Philadelphia 
Ledger. 

"He  has  never  hitherto  depicted  a  woman  character  with 
quite  so  much  insight,  skill  and  surety  as  he  portrays  Janet 
Bumpus." — New  York  Times. 

America,  dynamic,  changing,  diverse,  with  new  laws  and 
old  desires,  new  industries  and  old  social  rights,  new  people 
and  old — this  is  the  environment  in  which  Mr.  Churchill 
places  the  heroine  of  his  new  book.  He  has  never  written 
a  more  entertaining  story ;  he  has  never  written  one  that  is 
more  significant  in  its  interpretation  of  human  relation- 
ships to-day. 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

Publishers     64-66  Fifth  Avenue     New  York 


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